


Grey Skies and Sunshine

by aveyune23



Category: Hunger Games Trilogy - Suzanne Collins
Genre: Depression, F/M, Post-Mockingjay, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Pre-Epilogue Mockingjay, Pregnancy, Rated for language and sexual content
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-29
Updated: 2018-01-29
Packaged: 2018-05-04 00:32:30
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 13
Words: 51,296
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5313041
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aveyune23/pseuds/aveyune23
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Fifteen years after returning to District 12, she finally said 'yes'. A chronicle of the ups and downs of the Mellark's first pregnancy.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue

_“It took five, ten, fifteen years for me to agree. But Peeta wanted them so badly. When I first felt her stirring inside of me, I was consumed with a terror that felt as old as life itself. Only the joy of holding her in my arms could tame it.”_ ~ Mockingjay epilogue

Prologue: 

It’s hard to miss the look of longing on Peeta’s face as the family leaves the bakery, the little boy and girl waving their sticky hands and begging for the treats hidden in the white bag their mother carries. I guess I feel a twinge of it, too. It’s been years since the rebuilding of Panem, since the end of the Games. The Districts are no longer starving. Children no longer go hungry or fatherless. It is the best possible time to bring a new life into the world by all accounts.

But still I tell him no. 

Peeta and I have been married for twelve years now. It took a while for me to say yes to him on that one, too. Though it didn’t take long for us to find our way back to each other after the events in the Capitol, once he had healed and I had pulled myself from that dark prison in my mind – Dr. Aurelius calls it post-traumatic stress disorder, I just call it hell -- and he moved into the house awarded to me in the Victor’s Village. We had lived together for a year, in love and content, when the question of marriage came up. Peeta was eager, I was terrified. In the end I made him wait -- wasn’t I always? -- until I felt that we were truly stable, that it wasn’t an illusion caused by desperation. Two years of him asking me to marry him every other night, and then every Sunday, every other Sunday, every first Sunday of the month... until he finally stopped asking. He just waited patiently until one day, while I was cleaning up our room, I found the small box in his top drawer, shoved inside a sock that had no partner. I opened it to find my pearl, the one he had given to me in the second arena, set in a simple white gold band and surrounded by small chips of diamond that sparkled brightly in the light coming through the window. I stared at it for a moment, tucked carefully in its little velvet box, and then I darted out of the room. I found him in the yard, pulling weeds from the little herb garden he had started. He stood when he saw me coming, brushing his hands off on his pants and smiling. I smiled back and handed him the box.

“Ask me,” I had said, and when he’d seen what I had given him, he’d gaped for a moment and then his face split into a grin. He knelt down and pulled the ring from the box and had slid it onto my finger.

“Katniss, will you--?”

“Yes.”

And then he had laughed and kissed me and muttered something like “about damn time” and kissed me some more. 

We signed the marriage certificate in the new Justice Building. Haymitch was there, mildly sober, and Sae and her granddaughter. My mother had come from 4, bringing Annie and her son Finn, who was by then a rambunctious toddler who already resembled his father so much my eyes threatened to spill over every time I looked at him. Even Effie came from the Capitol, insisting that she wouldn’t have ever missed such a big, big, big day. Johanna was there, and Beetee, and Cressida and Pollux, who offered to tape the ceremony. Plutarch tried his best to make it a nationally televised event, but Peeta and Haymitch promptly told any of his cameramen to fuck off, and for that I was grateful. We had invited Gale, but he declined, blaming some important business in 2. He sent his love and best wishes, though. I didn’t mind his absence.

I wore my mother’s wedding dress. Before I went out to the main hall, we held each other and cried, grieving those who should have been there but weren’t: my father, Prim. She had put up my hair and told me I looked beautiful, and I was genuinely happy that she was there.

The signing was short. Haymitch walked me to the table where Thom, the new mayor, and Peeta waited. He had worn a fresh white shirt and newly pressed slacks, and he looked so like he had on the day of our Reaping, on the day our lives together began. Except here he was grinning ear to ear. He and I signed the paper, and Haymitch and my mother signed as witnesses, and we all had a glass of champagne to celebrate.

After, Peeta and I went home, and he baked a fresh loaf of bread. Sitting on the hearth in the living room, we sliced off two pieces and toasted them over the fire, and repeated the simple vows. And then we shared the slightly burnt bread, and slipped plain gold bands onto each other’s left ring finger, and we were married.

I glance down at the rings now, worn and perfect.

Peeta had wanted children right away. I had said no. Being married was one thing. Bringing children into a world that was still so vulnerable and uncertain was another. He fought me for a while, but after a few years he gave up. He knew he’d just have to wait. I don’t think he anticipated me making him wait for so long. 

So now here we are, married twelve years and childless. Peeta works at the bakery, I help harvest plants for medicines and sometimes hunt. The world is good again.

So why do I still tell him no?

I watch him, staring after the family as they walk away from the bakery and down the street. He is very much still the boy with the bread, optimistic and bright, though now and then he’ll cling to something solid and fight a flashback. I can’t see the lines around his eyes from where I’m sitting, but I know they’re there. Those and the ones across his forehead. Faint, but visible up close. The flashbacks take their toll, my nightmares do the same on me. I know I’m not getting any younger. We’re both just past thirty. I think about how things used to be, the way women my age then would bemoan a child, another mouth to feed, and the wrinkles it would add to their skin. Maybe I’ve made him wait too long.

“Katniss?”

I jerk out of my thoughts and find Peeta staring at me, his brows creased. 

“You okay? I’m ready to close up.”

I nod and gather up the berries I had been washing and dump them into a bowl. “I’m fine. I’ll just put these up.”

He nods and goes to lock up the back door in the storage room. I put the bowl in the ice box and put on my hunting jacket, and then wait for him to return. I’m overwhelmed with guilt. It’s not the first time. Every time we pass a family, when a child comes into the bakery, when we hear of a new birth in the district, I see Peeta light up and see the longing in his blue eyes, and I feel so guilty for denying him what he’s wanted for so long.

Maybe it’s time to give him a new answer. 

He emerges from the back with a loaf of bread for our dinner and puts his arm around my shoulders, planting a kiss on my forehead. “Shall we?”

I smile at him and nod, and we head out the front door. As Peeta locks up, I look out across the Square. The children from earlier are playing in the new fountain, their faces smeared with the chocolate frosting of the cupcakes their mother bought for them. I bite my lip. What would it be like to sit on a bench and watch our children play? I wouldn’t have to count down the days till their names were entered in the Reaping, wouldn’t have to watch them descend into the mines at 18. I could send them to school in clothes that are clean and new instead of in rags. I could keep their bellies full. I could sing to them.

Peeta sees me staring and takes my hand in his.

“Cute kids,” he says, his voice lighter than it should be. He’s waiting for me to shoot him down. Out of the corner of my eye I see him watching me carefully. I’m usually not so silent about it. Let him sweat it out, though. I’m still thinking.

“Katniss?”

I don’t look at him. I’m watching the little boy splash water at his sister. I hear their squeals of delight and the high peals of laughter and it brings a smile to my lips. We could be a family. I could have a family again, safe and whole. I’d never let the idea sink in before, had never let the thought finish forming until now. I was too scared. But now I let myself see the possibility. A family. 

“Katniss? You okay?”

“Peeta, I want a baby.”

I think he nearly falls down the steps in shock. I finally look at him, and he’s staring at me like I’ve grown wings.

“Come again?” he sputters. He even sticks a finger in his ear for good measure and wiggles it to dislodge whatever has apparently affected his hearing.

“Peeta,” I scowl, and then my expression softens. “I think I’m ready. For a baby.”

And then his eyes light up and he’s kissing me and laughing and asking over and over if I’m serious, and I laugh with him, saying yes, yes, now can we go home? People are staring. He practically drags me down the street. When we reach the Victor’s Village he pulls me up the steps to the front door and unlocks it as fast as he can without breaking the key. I’m yanked inside, the loaf of bread is tossed onto the entryway table, and then I am pushed against the wall and his lips are crashing onto mine. I respond immediately but break the kiss just as quickly, laughing at him.

“What about dinner?”

“Dinner can wait.” His fingers go to work at the buttons of my shirt.

“Peeta, it’s been stewing all day, it’ll be done--”

Against my collarbone I feel more than hear him mutter, “It can wait a little longer.”

I sigh, both from exasperation and pleasure, and eventually manage to push him away a bit, laughing breathlessly. “And so can you.” I start buttoning my shirt back up, much to his dismay. “Don’t you think we should talk about this--?”

“No.” When I raise an eyebrow at him, he rolls his eyes. “Katniss, we’ve been talking about this for years. If you say you’re finally ready, then why wait?”

“Dinner’s burning, that’s why.”

His nostrils flare and he sniffs the air, and he mumbles “dammit” as he rushes into the kitchen. I laugh again, but this time from nerves. He’s right. There’s no need to talk about it. We’ve talked about it enough. He’s wanted it so badly and I’ve been so selfish... I guess I just need reassurance that I’ve made the right decision. 

I follow him into the kitchen. He’s ladling stew into bowls, sorting out any pieces that simmered too long on the bottom of the pot and burned. I turn around and grab the bread then move to the counter to cut slices from it. Peeta sighs.

“Saved it just in time,” he says, setting the bowls down on the table. “But anyway...”

I shake my head. “Let’s eat first. Please?”

He agrees, but when we sit down, neither of us have an appetite. Peeta’s leg is bouncing beneath the table and my stomach is churning. Eventually we snap.

“You’re sure about this?”

I meet his eyes. “We’ve waited long enough.” He raises a condescending eyebrow and I scowl. “Fine. I’ve made you wait long enough.”

“What made you change your mind? The Mackey kids?”

I nod. “Partly. The rest...” After all this time it can still be hard for me to open up so deeply, but he’s my husband and knows me better than I know myself, so I continue. “I know it’s safe now, for them. That it’s a safe place to have a family. It’s not a bad idea anymore.”

He’s giving me that look, the one I first saw in the cave all those years ago, the one that is only for me. The one full of awe that it’s possible for me to love him back, to give him such a gift.

“I want this,” I whisper, loud enough that he can hear me from across the table. “I just wasn’t ready before. I was afraid. You know that.”

He nods and reaches out to take my hand. “But you’re ready now? Really ready?”

I nod, and the grin that spreads across his face is infectious and I have to shake my head and smile back. Then he’s jumping up from the table and pulling me from my seat. I shout as he picks me up and throws me over his shoulder like I’m a bag of flour. 

“Peeta!”

“C’mon. We’ve got a baby to make.”

I laugh at his enthusiasm. “Peeta, put me down! I haven’t even stopped taking the pills I’ve been on to prevent--”

“So don’t take them tonight and from now on.” He hefts me up with a grunt and starts to climb the stairs. “Problem solved.”

I roll my eyes and give up on trying to get down. “I won’t get pregnant overnight, you know.”

He pushes open our bedroom door and dumps me unceremoniously onto our bed, then yanks his shirt over his head and tosses it to the side. The look in his eyes is like fire.

“Well, Katniss, we can damn well try.”


	2. Week 5

**Week Five**

- _March_ -

“Katniss? I made breakfast, come downstairs!”

I groan and roll over in the bed, trying to pretend I hadn’t heard him. I don’t feel hungry, to be honest. I’d much rather keep sleeping. But Peeta rarely lets me sleep in. I won’t be able to ignore him for long.

“Katniss?”

I bury my head under my pillow and curl up. The movement makes my stomach churn and I frown. Am I coming down with something? I know the flu is going around; mid-March is perfect for it. But I haven’t been around anyone who’s had it, so I don’t know how I could have caught it, unless --

“Katniss?” Peeta pokes his blond head in the door. “You okay?”

I groan in response, and I hear him step into the room. He’s carrying something. I can tell by the way he walks: heavier footsteps than usual. He sits on the edge of the bed and I roll over to see what he has brought. But I smell it before I see it, and my stomach heaves.

“Oh god.”

I’m up and running to the bathroom before he can ask what’s wrong. I retch into the toilet, feeling like I’m being turned inside out. When it finally stops, there’s a cool washcloth against my forehead and a glass of water being pushed into my hand.

“Sips,” Peeta says, flushing the toilet for me. “Are you getting sick? Is everything okay?”

I wipe at my face with the cool cloth. “I dunno, I just woke up.”

He creases his brows. “Think you’re going to make it?”

I shrug. I’m shaking a bit, but I think I might just need some food and water. I ask him what he’d made for breakfast and he tells me he’d made eggs and a loaf of hearty whole grain bread. It was the eggs that had gotten me. 

“They just smelled bad,” I say, letting him pull me up. He shrugs.

“They smell fine to me.” He’s still frowning at me, like he’s trying to solve the puzzle. I catch his eyes flick to the calendar on the wall, and my brain reorganizes itself. Oh.

It’s been six months since the day I told Peeta I was ready to start a family. I had been right about not getting pregnant that first night, but when a whole month had passed I had started to worry, and when my cycle came and went, I had begun to panic. Peeta said I was overreacting, that these things take time, that they’re hit and miss, and of course he was right. But a month later when I had my cycle again, I had started to wonder if I was too old, if my body had taken too much damage in the past. Without telling Peeta, I had actually gone to see the doctor in town, and she had just smiled after looking me over and said to keep trying, that being on birth control for so long meant that it would take a bit for my body to be ready to carry a baby again, that it would happen soon and not to worry. It had eased my panic only a little. I looked at the little red dots on the calendar with frustration every day until it slipped my mind. I looked at it now.

I was almost two weeks late.

Peeta sees my face blanch and then he’s pushing me back to the toilet so that I can throw up again. It doesn’t last so long this time -- there’s nothing left in my stomach -- but I retch until my toes hurt. Peeta wipes my face again and hands me the glass of water, frowning the whole time. 

“Katniss?”

There are a lot of questions behind my name, but I shake my head at him and sip some water.

“Some toast would be nice,” I say, giving him a small smile. “I’ll meet you downstairs?”

He nods, knowing he’s been dismissed. I hate that I still do that to him sometimes, but right now I need to think without him frowning at me in concern the whole time, and he knows that, even though he’ll pretend I just want to feel miserable for a moment. To prove it, he kisses my forehead and smiles at me.

“I’ll go make some toast then. No eggs on it?”

If I turn green, it isn’t too visible, but I know he’s joking. He’s worried about me. 

“No eggs,” I reply, and he smiles again and leaves. I lean back against the tub and sigh.

Well shit. 

I start counting the days in my head. Well over a month since my last cycle. I should have started about two weeks ago. Peeta and I have been making love as often as we had before this whole baby-making business had started -- that is, practically every other night. Nausea, fatigue... There’s no other diagnosis.

I’m pregnant. Or most likely, anyway. I’ll have to go to Dr. Bryke to be sure.

When I think I can stand without my stomach churning too much, I get up and head out of the bathroom to get dressed for the day. Peeta has taken whatever tray he had brought up back to the kitchen, thankfully, but a smell still lingers that tastes unpleasant in my mouth. I change out of my pajamas as quick as I can, and go downstairs, but not before opening the windows more. The air is crisp and cold on my face and I take a deep breath of it, filling my lungs. Maybe I’ll go for a walk...

I find Peeta in the kitchen, laying out a plate of toast for me. The fresh bread smells a thousand times better than the eggs, which he’s tactfully disposed of. He flashes a smile my way.

“I didn’t know if you’d want tea or hot chocolate so I made both.”

I can’t help sighing at how considerate he is. My husband, the man I couldn’t survive without. The father of my child.

“Thank you,” I say, and take a seat. He’s put out butter and jam for my toast. I eye the jars hesitantly, but a sniff of strawberry preserves makes my stomach grumble, and I’m spooning it on to a slice of toast before I can really think about it. Peeta raises an eyebrow at me.

“Good to see you have an appetite,” he says, and I lick strawberry stickiness off of my finger.

“It’s delicious.”

He watches me start on another slice with suppressed amusement, and then takes a sip of his hot chocolate. I smile at him. He’s had hot chocolate for breakfast every morning since the trains started bringing it to 12.

“Katniss, what’s going on?”

“Hmm?”

He squints at me, trying to figure me out from across the table. I set down my toast, waiting for the questions to start. But he gets straight to the point. 

“Are you pregnant?”

I hesitate, then shrug. “I don’t know.”

“I know you’re late,” he says, and when my face flushes he just rolls his eyes. “Katniss, I’ve been married to you for twelve years and was with you for three more before that, don’t act like it’s still a secret you can keep from me.”

“I’m not! I just don’t like talking about it.”

He shakes his head. “Katniss, seriously. Are you?”

I shrug again, but a little niggling feeling in my chest has started to grow. “I don’t know, really. I mean, maybe... but --”

“ -- but you don’t want to get my hopes up.”

My eyes snap to his. He doesn’t honestly think I’m just doing this for him, does he?

“I don’t want to get my hopes up,” I snap, frowning at him. “Peeta, I want this! I want to have a baby! But I’m --”

“Not sure. Got it.” He takes a drink of his hot chocolate. I stare at him, waiting for him to continue, to grin, to act as excited as I thought he’d be. But he just drinks his hot chocolate. I look down at my toast, but it’s turned to rot in my mind. Why isn’t he saying anything? Let alone jumping around the table like I thought he’d be?

“Peeta?”

“Hm?”

And that’s when I see the spark in his eye, and my anxiety eases a bit. He’s beaming from the inside. But he’s afraid to get his hopes up. I smile at him.

“Come to the doctor with me?”

My Peeta returns in a flash, practically throwing his mug down and jumping from his chair. He’s grinning from ear to ear as he grabs my hand and pulls me toward the front door.

“C’mon, hurry! We could’ve been there ages ago --”

I have to laugh, if only to keep the anxiety from bubbling over. Peeta hands me my hunting jacket and we leave the house and head to the new clinic in the district.

Dr. Bryke was originally from District 4, but after being trained as a doctor at the new hospital my mother helped to establish, she came to 12, since we had a vacancy for a healer. I guess I’m still a little bitter about my mom not returning. But I’ve gotten better. We speak once a year now, instead of hardly ever.

A receptionist greets us inside. When she asks why we’re visiting, Peeta and I glance at each other. Even after 15 years, we’re still considered somewhat national celebrities, though the people in 12 don’t really think about it much anymore. This girl looks new, though. Capitol, even. And Capitol means Plutarch Heavensbee and his ridiculous publicity. Thankfully, Dr. Bryke walks into the room and saves us. 

“Katniss, Peeta! What brings you here today?” She is small and lightly built, with dark blond hair and green eyes that remind me of Finnick. She’s been a great asset to our District, and I genuinely like her. I can’t say the same for the receptionist, who is eyeing us with great interest. I see her flawlessly manicured hand reach toward the phone, and I glare at her.

“Don’t even think about it,” Peeta says in a low voice. At first I think he’s telling me off, but when I look up at him I see that he’s watching the girl with hard eyes. She’s frozen in her seat, and her hand darts away from the phone. I decide that her lilac eyebrows are ugly and turn back to Dr. Bryke, who has tactfully ignored the exchange. Another thing I like about her. Her mouth quivers a bit, like she wants to laugh, and Peeta and I smile at her. She smiles back.

“Come into my office, please,” she says, and leads us into another room. It doesn’t have the stark whiteness of other hospitals or medical wards or sick bays I’ve been in before, and I sense that my mother is behind this. Clean and sterile, yes, but also safe. Not a prison. Not 13. I sigh, breathing relief. The first time I had come here I had expected that antiseptic white oppression. I’m glad they built this instead.

Dr. Bryke seats us in two plush chairs across from herself at her desk and smiles at us. I think she’s noticed that Peeta hasn’t let go of my hand since we got here. He’s been holding on to it since we left the house. I think part of him might be afraid that I’ll come to my senses and make a run for it, so I squeeze his hand in reassurance. He’s worried over nothing, of course. If I had wanted to run, I would’ve done it a long time ago.

“So what brings the two of you here today?” she asks. She’s a little older than Peeta and I. Maybe in her 40s. It shows in the lines of her face, especially when she smiles like she does now. I think she always smiles. It’s not something I’m used to. I give a bit of hesitant smile back. I’m still anxious.

“Well...” This time Peeta squeezes my hand. I take a deep breath. “I think I might be pregnant.”

Dr. Bryke claps her hands together. “Well then! I suppose you’ll be wanting me to check for sure?” I nod, and Peeta is squeezing my hand again, this time not letting up. A glance at him tells me that he’s bracing himself. Back straight, jaw set -- though to any other person he would look fairly relaxed. I know better.

“I’ll just need to do a test or two,” says Dr. Bryke. “Get some samples. If you’ll come with me, Mrs. Mellark...”

I nod and stand, nearly have to pry my hand from Peeta’s grip. He’s looking at me with puppy eyes, but I roll mine and kiss the top of his head, right on the cowlick at his crown that I love so much.

“You’ll be fine. Just a few minutes, okay?”

He pouts, making me roll my eyes again, and then he sighs.

“Okay, fine.”

I laugh and kiss him again, and follow Dr. Bryke into an examination room. She gives me a small cup and tells me to relieve myself into it, and once I’ve done that she’ll take a small sample of blood, too. I do as she says, feeling ridiculous in the small side room as I try to piss in a cup. I manage and hand it off to a nurse while another prepares to take a bit of blood. She pricks my finger and lets the blood well up, then makes me press my finger into a computer-like machine. There’s no screen on it, so I don’t know what it’s doing or how it will tell them anything, but then again, I’m not the healer. When she’s placed a small bandage on my fingertip, the nurse says I can go back and wait with Peeta and that Dr. Bryke would be with us shortly. Feeling a little overwhelmed, I return to Dr. Bryke’s office. Peeta jumps up when I come in, but I just shrug and he sits back down.

“What’d they do?”

I take my seat next to him. “Pricked my finger and made me pee in a cup.”

He chuckles. “Sounds like tribute prep all over again.”

I cringe a bit, remembering. I know Peeta is just trying to ease our anxiety, but some fears are still frightening even in the daytime. I try to joke with him.

“At least they’re not yanking all the hair off my body,” I say, and Peeta quirks a smile at me. His hand is back around mine, strong and supportive, but nerves still stick in my throat.

“Peeta, if it turns out I’m not --”

“Shh. Then we’ll keep trying. You said the doctor told you before that taking birth control for a long time can make it harder to --”

“But what if I’m too old? What if I made you wait too long and now it’s too late? Or what if I’m damaged, if my body took too much damage and I’ll never be able to --”

“Katniss, look at me.”

My words die in my throat and he turns in his chair so that he can look directly into my eyes. “First off,” he says, “you’re freaking out. Stop it. Second,” and here he reaches out and cups my cheek in his palm, “if it comes to any of that, you should know by now that you are all I will ever need in my life. I want you. And if Dr. Bryke comes in here and says no, then we try again. If she says it’s you or me that can’t make it happen, then it doesn’t matter. I have you, I can die a happy man knowing that I have you. You’re the only thing I have ever needed to survive. Got that?”

I nod dumbly, feeling stupid for even panicking. He’s right. He’s always right. And I always hate it. We sit there in silence, clutching each other’s hands until the door opens and Dr. Bryke walks back in. She’s smiling, but she’s always smiling, it might not mean --

She takes a seat behind her desk and folds her hands over the manila folder she’d brought in with her. The test results, I presume. Peeta’s hand is crushing mine. I think he wants to know worse than I do, especially when he leans forward slightly and demands, “Well?”

Dr. Bryke’s eyes glint as she grins at his insistence. She looks at me.

“Congratulations, Mr. and Mrs. Mellark. You’re expecting.”

\---------------------------------------

We walk through the woods, towards the lake, our fingers laced together like the branches over our heads. The sun passes by the sleeping buds, bright and thin across our faces and hands. Birds flutter above us, oblivious of those below them, too busy chattering and collecting things to build new nests. It is not quite spring, the last vestiges of winter trying desperately to hang on, but life is pushing up all around us. I feel it pulse through my veins like it pulses through a purple crocus. New, full of energy and vibrant. The promise of life after winter and death. A promise that the world still turns.

I glance up at my husband, who is carefully picking his way over a rocky outcrop. His prosthetic leg is usually isn’t noticeable, but out in the rough he’s a little more unsure on it, and he clambers over obstacles like he’s wearing a wooden peg and not a custom built, state-of-the-art Capitol creation. If it hurts him, he doesn’t say so. But I don’t think anything could hurt him today.

He turns at the bottom of outcrop to help me down. I don’t need it, but he’s probably got it into his head that I’m fragile now, so I let him. It’s going to be a long nine months of Peeta coddling me, I think. Hopefully I don’t kill him before it’s over.

We don’t speak as we walk; there’s no need. Pleasure and excitement radiates off Peeta like sunshine. I’m all nerves, like if someone touched me I’d break from sheer anxiousness. But Peeta holds my hand, and every now and then he stops and pulls me to his chest and kisses me. Sweet and lingering, an expression of everything that he’s too overwhelmed to voice just now. We separate and grin like fools and he whispers that he loves me over and over and I feel so torn between incessant joy and absolute terror. Was it supposed to be like this?

We eventually emerge at the lake clearing. The water shines in the midday sun, the breeze whipping up little waves on its surface. The cabin stands on its banks, the same as it’s always been. Solid. Solitary. Safe.

I leave Peeta to step into the tall grass. He lets me go, knowing why I wanted to come here. This is the place where I am closest to my father. I know Peeta is watching me, ready to leap if I start to break down, but I am feeling surprisingly calm as I move toward the cabin. The door is still shut, no animals have gotten inside. I pull the small stool in the corner to the middle of the room and sit down, breathing deep the musk and wild, and I close my eyes.

“Daddy,” I whisper to the walls. The chatter of mockingjays from the trees outside answer me, and I smile sadly. It’s as good a response as any. A hum starts in my throat, a tune that I thought I had forgotten. The words don’t come, but I know they will eventually. I place a hand on my stomach, below my navel, still taut and flat. I’m a little nauseous and nervous, and wanting to cry for help. Not because I’m in danger, but because I’m scared as hell. I’m now responsible for another life. But that’s not new to me, is it? I was responsible for Prim’s life, for my mother’s, after my father died. I’m responsible for Peeta, just as he is responsible for me. This baby will be no different. It shouldn’t. But what if it is? It’s a stranger growing inside of me, a parasite that will slowly take over my body and then my life.

But just as I begin to feel trapped, to panic, I remember the look on Peeta’s face after we’d been told the news. The way his eyes had lit up, how I thought he might cry from sheer joy. The way he’d kissed me like Dr. Bryke wasn’t even in the room. How that stupid grin hasn’t left his face since we left the clinic. And I remember the way he looked at me, like I had given him the most precious gift in the world. It’s the look he’d worn when I told him I loved him for the first time, when I agreed to marry him. It’s the look of all his wildest dreams coming true.

And now it’s my dream, too.

“I wish you were here, Daddy,” I whisper. “I need you.” My answer is silence, so I begin to hum again. It’s a lullaby, I remember. An old one, he’d said, from the days before Panem. I search for the words, but I find nothing, so I content myself with humming broken strains of the tune.

Sometime later there’s a knock on the door, and I turn and see Peeta standing in the door frame, silhouetted by sunlight. It glints off his dark blond curls like gold, and he’s watching me with liquid sky eyes. I’m mesmerized. What did I do right in my history of mistakes to deserve him? To have him? His expression is questioning, and I smile softly at him and stand.

“Ready to go?” he asks. He hasn’t come into the cabin. Maybe he’s afraid of disturbing the sanctity of it. I don’t mind. I think I want it to myself just a little bit longer. I walk out and shut the door behind me, then stand on tiptoe and kiss him. 

“Let’s go home.”  
\-------------------------------

The sun is low in the sky when we return to the Victor’s Village. Peeta’s hand is wrapped around mine even as he digs for the keys in his pocket. While I wait for him to unlock the door, I look across the lawn to Haymitch’s house. The kitchen light is on but no shadow breaks it. I’m looking for his flock of geese when Peeta catches me looking. His eyes light up.

“We have to tell Haymitch!” he says, and leaves the keys in the door and tugs me down the steps. I pull against him.

“No!” When he stops and stares at me, I sputter. “I mean -- I just -- it’s a bit soon, don’t you think?”

Peeta eyes me, trying to figure out the real reason I don’t want to go. “He’s our friend, Katniss. He’s the reason we’re even together. Or alive, for that matter. He should be the first to know.”

He has a good point, but telling a plastered Haymitch that we’re expecting doesn’t sound appealing. In fact, it sounds downright nauseating. Or maybe that’s morning sickness (which isn’t just for the morning, I’m quickly finding out). It’s hard to tell.

“Maybe tomorrow?” I try, but Peeta doesn’t buy it. He shakes his head at me and tugs on my hand again.

“If we don’t do it now, you’ll wait until you’re big enough for him to notice it on his own.” When I open my mouth to protest he cocks an eyebrow up. “Katniss, seriously.”

We stare at each other until I finally snap. “All right, fine!” I say, throwing my hands up in defeat. “But if I puke from the reek in there then one of you two gets to clean it up.”

He nods and rolls his eyes in that “yeah, yeah, I know, dear” way he’s developed over the years, and pulls me to Haymitch’s front door. I tap my foot as Peeta knocks. It out of courtesy only -- both of us know he won’t answer. So after he knocks once, Peeta opens the door and we let ourselves in. The stench hits me like a sucker punch to the gut. Peeta now sees I wasn’t joking.

“Whoa, you okay?” he asks, unsure if he should reach for me or step outside my potential vomit radius. I shake my head but wave him off. 

“I’ll be sure to puke on his clothes. He won’t be able to tell the difference.” Peeta cracks a smile, but it’s the sad reality out old mentor lives in. He drinks till the liquor runs out, minds his geese until the train brings him more, rants and raves like usual, disappears for days on end and then randomly appears in our kitchen, looking like death warmed over. But Peeta is right. He’s really the only family we have left.

We search the lower floor of the house, but Haymitch is nowhere to be found. The kitchen light is still on, and it looks like he might have been through here. That’s when Peeta notices that the back door is open. I glare at him. I risked losing whatever food I’ve been able to keep down for nothing. 

I bolt out the back door and gulp fresh air, clearing the smell of liquor and vomit out of my nose. Peeta follows more sedately and nods at Haymitch, who is sitting on a bench next to the house, a bottle in his hand. When I catch my breath I look his way and find he’s frowning at me.

“What?” I snap. I’ll never be good with words around Haymitch.

“The hell is wrong with you?” he asks, and judging by the serious lack of a slur to his words, he’s only just woken up and begun drinking. This could be good or bad. Still, I glare at him.

“Your house is disgusting,” I say, and he puts his hands in the air.

“Oooh, criticism from the damned Housewife of the Year! Excuse me, if I’d known you were coming, I’d’ve tidied up a bit.” He takes a swig from the bottle of white liquor. I can smell it from where I’m standing and my stomach roils again. Haymitch notices me blanch and he narrows his eyes at me.

“She sick or something?” he asks Peeta. “I don’t want her spewin’ on my nice lawn.”

The ‘lawn’ is practically an overgrown field. “That’s rich,” I say. Peeta shoots me a disapproving look and I shrug.

“Actually, Haymitch,” Peeta says, taking my hand in his, “we wanted to tell you something.”

This time our mentor narrows his eyes at my husband. “This ain’t a damn intervention, is it?”

“No, but everyone knows you need one,” I snap.

Haymitch and I share a glare, but Peeta presses forward, determined to make this moment celebratory.

“Katniss and I are going to have a baby,” he says a little too loudly, like he knows he has to shout to break through the look Haymitch and I are exchanging. I break it to look at Peeta, who is now fidgeting, and I have to suppress a laugh. He’s excited and wants to share it. I just wish there were other people around to share it with. Haymitch, on the other hand, stares dumbly at Peeta for a moment, then focuses on me, like he’s looking for a sign of the truth.

“Well I’ll be damned,” he says. I expect him to say more, but that’s it. We stand there awkwardly until Peeta breaks the silence again. 

“She’s due in November,” he says, and I’m afraid he’ll start spilling all of the details, but Haymitch speaks again.

“Well congratulations,” he says, and raises his bottle to us before taking a long drink. When he comes up for air, he grins at us with yellow teeth. “About damn time, too. Figured you’d’ve popped out ‘bout half a dozen by now.”

Peeta bites his lip and I am gearing towards a rage.

“Course, the way you are, sweetheart, I’m surprised you let him get one on you at all.”

I say through gritted teeth, “I changed my mind.”

“Yeah, yeah.” He dismisses me with a wave of his hand. “So do I get to be ‘uncle’ or what?”

That’s it. I grab Peeta’s wrist and pull him around the house and back to our front door, which I throw open and storm through. Peeta shuts it behind him, trying to hide the smirk of amusement on his face.

“I dunno, I think ‘Uncle Haymitch’ sounds good, what about you?”

I huff in frustration and collapse on the couch, my face buried in a pillow. I’m silent for a while as he leans on the back of the sofa, waiting for me to surface.

“I’m sorry, what was that?”

I sit up and repeat, “‘Uncle Haymitch’ won’t be allowed near our child unless he’s sober.” Our eyes meet, and Peeta’s face slowly crack into a grin, and I can’t help but do the same. And then we’re laughing and he’s kissing me and staring at me in wonder.

“This is really happening,” he says. I nod, scared out of my mind.

“We’re really doing this.”

He looks at me, worry in his eyes. “Are you scared?”

“Terrified.”

A smile graces his lips. “Me too,” he admits. “But it’s going to be worth it.”

I nod, calmed by his enthusiasm, but still nervous enough to scream. It had sure as hell better be.


	3. Week 10

**Week 10**

I stand in front of the mirror and frown at my reflection. 

I’ve never been one to care about how I look, let alone ever lament my weight like those idiots in the Capitol. I’ve always been underweight, too thin. Slender at best. I’ve never been curvy or felt like I had a feminine figure.

I certainly don’t feel that way now.

I turn my nose up at how heavy I feel. My breasts are sore and -- to my dismay and Peeta’s guilty delight, damn him -- are getting larger. Peeta says I don’t look any bigger, but he’s wrong.

I’m getting fat.

“Katniss?”

“Go away!” I snap, though I’m not really sure why. I hear Peeta freeze outside the door. 

“You okay in there?”

I’m giving myself an awful look, and I grumble out, “No.”

There’s silence for a second, then, “Can I come in?”

“No! I’m not dressed!” But I don’t move to find something to cover myself with. I’m too busy glaring at my thighs.

“And that’s mattered since... when, exactly?”

I don’t have a good retort to that. So I settle for the truth.

“I don’t want you to see me like this.”

I hear him laugh and then the bathroom door opens and he steps inside. “Katniss, you look fine.”

I frown at him in the mirror. “I feel like a hovercraft.”

He raises an eyebrow at me. “You do realize that you’re only going to get bigger, right?”

My jaw drops and I turn on him, swatting his arm.

He shields his face as I rain blows down on him, laughing loudly. “It’s the truth!” he shouts. “I’m only telling the truth -- oh, c’mere --!”

He grabs me around the waist and hikes me up so that I’m no longer touching the floor. I struggle in his arms for a moment before going limp. Let gravity and my fat ass dead weight get me down. But I’ve apparently forgotten that he’s hefted supply crates heavier than me, because he just lets me hang there like a rag doll.

“You done?” he asks, laughter still in his voice. I sigh and kick my legs a bit.

“I guess,” I mumble, and he sets me down but keeps his arms around me. His lips find the junction of my neck and shoulder and he presses a kiss there, his hands resting on my belly. His fingers splay out over my skin, covering the imperceptible swelling there, and he pulls me back against his chest. I slump a little, shifting till I am comfortable with his clothes that are rough on my skin. We watch our reflections, ever so gently swaying in each other’s arms. I see his eyes sweep up and down my body in the mirror, dark and full of emotion. He sighs in my ear.

“You’re beautiful,” he whispers, not taking his eyes off me in the mirror. “You’ll always be beautiful.”

I sigh and close my eyes as his lips find the spot beneath my ear. His thumbs start to rub circles just above the front of my pelvic bone, massaging away the cramps that I’ve been having there for a few weeks now. I melt into his arms as he leaves kisses on my neck and shoulder and presses the pads of his thumbs into my hips. One of his hands reaches between us and massages the small of my back. I can’t help but moan at how good it feels.

“Peeta,” I sigh, and reach a hand up to curl my fingers at the nape of his neck. He hums into my skin and I smile a bit. I can feel his hardness pressed against me, and that certainly makes me feel a little less ugly, but I just don’t feel up to sex at the moment... 

“Katniss?”

I hadn’t realized that I had squirmed away from him. He’s watching me in the mirror with concern, and I turn away so that I don’t have to see him stare.

“What’s wrong?” he asks, and I can’t help but turn up my nose.

“I’m fat,” I moan, and thankfully he doesn’t laugh this time, but I can see his lips twitch.

“You’re not fat --”

“Well I feel fat!” I snap. He bites his lip and sobers himself.

“Katniss, I think you’re overreacting. Your body’s going through a lot right now and it’s only going to get --”

“If you say ‘worse’ --”

“-- more intense and different,” he finishes pointedly. “Dr. Bryke said it would be weird for you. You’re supposed to gain weight, remember? You’re growing a baby!”

I look down at my stomach and frown. “I’m gonna be huge...”

Peeta finally laughs and put his arms around me and pulls me close. “And I will love you and think you’re beautiful even when you’re huge,” he says, grinning at my indignation. “I’ll think you’re beautiful even when you’re so big you can’t bend over, or see your feet, or do anything.” I’m about to hit him, but he kisses me and says, “Because I love you.” I sigh and nod, not really reassured, but feeling less panicky. And then I start to wonder why I was panicking, and I frown again.

“I’m sorry,” I say, shaking my head. “I just feel so strange. And fat.” I laugh, a little hysterical. “I know I’m not but I feel like it and I’ve never felt like this before and it’s awful.” Tears sting my eyes and that’s when I know I’ve gone crazy. “I’m fat and my hips hurt and I’m nauseous all the time so I can’t eat and when I do I get heartburn and --”

“-- And now you’re getting emotional,” Peeta interrupts, his eyes a little wide as he puts his hands on my shoulders. “And to be honest, it’s kind of scary,” he adds. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen you so worked up about something before. You gonna be okay?”

I wipe at my face and laugh again, not believing that I’m doing. I’ve really lost it. 

“Yeah. I will be.”

“Okay,” he says. “Now get dressed. You’re distracting me.” He slaps my rear for good measure before he leaves and I jump, narrowing my eyes at him until the door shuts. But I sigh and pull fresh clothes on, braiding my hair over my shoulder like usual. I’m supposed to go out and scout for new medicinal plants with a few women from town. I’m not exactly looking forward to it, seeing as though I’m still not very sociable, but I grew up with some of these women, and I’ve come to realize that we all have an obligation to help rebuild our world, so I’ve done all I can. But I’m nervous. Mostly because we’ve kept the pregnancy a secret from the public. It was Peeta’s idea, surprisingly; he didn’t want word getting out and finding its way to the Capitol and Plutarch Heavensbee before we were ready to deal with it. Because eventually we will have to face the public eye again, and I shudder just thinking about it. 

Peeta has toast and hot grain ready for me on the table, and I eat it quickly. He’s in the storage room, probably fishing out some special ingredient or another that he doesn’t keep at the bakery, but I wait for him before I leave. I know he’ll want to walk with me at least as far as the bakery. To kill time as he shuffles around, I take my bow and quiver off the hook by the door and sling it over my shoulder. Might as well take advantage of my outing while my front is still small enough to shoot.

Peeta emerges from the storeroom with a block of white chocolate that he’s wrapping in cheese cloth. He eyes my bow and smiles. 

“Ready to go?”

I nod and he stuffs the block into a bag and joins me at the door. “Feeling better?” he asks, placing a kiss on my cheek. I shrug.

“Can’t guarantee I won’t break down in the woods for no reason,” I tell him, and he cracks a smile that disappears when I glare at him. 

“Sorry. But don’t worry, there’ll be people with you. Won’t Delly be there?”

I nod. Yes, Delly will be there. Sweet, kind Delly, with three children and well rounded with a fourth. One of the few people that I genuinely like. She might keep me sane. If anything, I can ask her for advice when the others aren’t listening. 

“I just fell... frazzled,” I try to explain, fingering the worn leather strap across my chest as I search for the right words. “Like I’ll either start to cry or laugh for no reason and not stop.”

“Hysterical?”

“Maybe, but not quite. Like...” I frown. “Nothing is logical, like how all I want right now is to eat cheese buns until I explode.”

Peeta laughs as he opens the front door for me. “I don’t know if I can bake that many today,” he says as we walk into the April sun, watered down by a smattering of clouds. “But I can try and get in a tray or two.”

I throw my arms around him and kiss his lips. “That would make me so happy,” I tell him, and he laughs again.

“Good,” he says. “Now come on, we’ll be late.”

\-----------------------------------------

I meet Delly and the other women at the fence, which has been left up to keep any leftover mutts out, though it’s no longer electrified. A gate has been put in at my request. 32 is a little too old to be crawling under fences, pregnant or not. Others have been venturing into the woods for plants and for wild game and for their own enjoyment, too, so a gate seemed like a smart idea. Part of me is still a little uncomfortable with others being in the woods; these trees are mine. My father’s. His and mine and Gale’s --

I frown a bit. I haven’t thought of Gale in a long time. Maybe I should call him, maybe tell him the news. I know that he’s married, has children. There are only old memories between us now. Surely he’d be happy for Peeta and I. But then I have to shake my head at the absurdity of it. I haven’t even called my mother to tell her, and I’m two months pregnant. If I pick up the phone to tell anyone, it will be her. Which means no one will find out until the baby is born, because for some reason I am loathe to call my mother, and I can’t figure out why. 

Delly interrupts my thoughts with a cheery hello. Well into her fourth pregnancy (she married a soldier from 13 after the war), she is lovely with her thick ash blond hair and rosy cheeks. I’m wondering if she’s fit enough to be out here when she hoists a basket onto her hip and straightens her shoulders, looking ready to tackle a bear instead of some plants, and I change my mind.

“Hi, Delly. You’re looking... well.” I’m still not good at small talk, but it’s never fazed her. She beams at me and places a hand on her belly. 

“Ready for this one to be done and out,” she jokes, and the other women take this as a cue to join in the discussion. All of them are mothers, and suddenly I’m tempted to shout out that I’m one of them now, or almost, anyway, but I keep my mouth shut. They’d run off and tell everyone. Gossip is one of the main pastimes in 12 and always has been. I fidget as they chatter and rub Delly’s belly and exclaim when the baby kicks. The excitement makes the younger, newer ones brave.

“Katniss, when are you and Peeta going to have a baby?” one of them asks, an immigrant to the district. She’s from 8, I think, but I’ve forgotten her name. It was just a question, with no accusations or implications behind it, but I feel my face flush. Thankfully, one of the others steps in. 

“Dinah, that’s rude!” Ryle says. She’s from 12, and was barely a teenager when the Rebellion happened -- she might have been younger than Prim -- but she knows that it’s not a topic one brings up with me in earshot, let alone asks to my face. Her tanned face is apprehensive, wondering what I’ll do, and I sigh.

“It’s fine, Ryle,” I say. “But it’s a private matter. Between me and my husband,” I add, looking at Dinah, who nods at me. Delly smiles and changes the subject with a clap of her hands. 

“Shall we, ladies?”

The others nod and pick up their baskets, leading the way into the woods. They’ve gone with me enough times to no longer be afraid of the trees. But Delly hangs back and takes the rear with me, waiting until the others are far enough ahead to lean in and whisper to me.

“You won’t be able to hide it much longer, you know,” she says, and I stare at her in shock.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I stammer, but it’s written all over my face. I still can’t lie, and she knows it. She’s changed so much from the shy, sweet girl that I knew from the rebellion. A husband and three kids apparently has a big effect.

“Katniss, I’ve had three already, I know what a pregnant woman looks like.” She smiles. “I’d say only a few months.”

I gape at her, and nearly trip over a tree root, so I look at my feet and nod dumbly. Delly takes my hand and gives it a squeeze. “That’s wonderful,” she says quietly, and I can hear the happiness in her whisper. A weight lifts off my chest. There, I’ve told someone. Oh God, I’ve told someone.

I stop and lower my voice to a hiss. “Delly, you can’t tell anyone. Peeta and I don’t want --”

She waves a hand, dismissing my words. “Oh, I know. I figured that’s why you hadn’t said anything. Do you think I’d let it leak to the Capitol press? Honestly, Katniss...”

And in that moment I realize that, although she’s changed, Delly has been one of my true and only friends for a long time.

“But you think they’d make a big deal out of it still?” she continues. “It’s been so long.”

I shrug. “We have to assume they will. Plutarch is ruthless when it comes to getting his publicity.”

She nods, and we come upon the other women, who are already digging up tubers and roots or plucking leaves from plants. Delly heads over to one of the women and kneels next to her to help, which leaves me with nothing to do but hunt a bit. I look over the figures bent to their work in the leaf litter, chatting amongst themselves. Delly can handle them, I’m sure, so I pull my bow from my back and string it.

“I’m going to hunt for a bit,” I announce. Some of them turn and nod, but most ignore me. I don’t mind. It means they won’t disturb me. 

I creep into the trees, falling into silence as the brush swallows me. Hunting is no longer necessary for survival, but it’s necessary for my sanity. It’s a calm environment that doesn’t ever really change except for with the seasons, but the seasons themselves are routine. And Dr. Aurelius said routine would help me find stability, and he was right. I only take a squirrel or two, a deer if there’s a large occasion or the opportunity presents itself and is too good to pass up. Today I’ll only take a squirrel. Peeta can bake it for dinner. I have my arrow trained on one when the nausea hits. I barely miss puking on my boots.

When the retching has passed, I lean against a tree and wipe at my mouth. The squirrel is gone. I stab the arrow back into my quiver, my stomach still churning. 

“Goddammit.”

\--------------------------

I somehow manage to bag two squirrels, but field dressing them resulted in more nausea. I returned to the women green in the face, but no one except Delly seems to notice. They all look ready to head home, and the sun is getting low in the sky, so I lead us out of the trees and back to the fence. Out of the gate they go their separate ways, chatting in pairs or triads off to their homes. Only Delly stays behind, smiling at me knowingly.

“Still getting sick?” she asks, nestling her basket under her arm. I unstring my bow and put it away before answering.

“Not as bad as before. Cleaning the squirrels was really bad, though.”

“Have you tried tea --?”

“Every night. The heartburn is too bad for anything else.”

“Peppermint works best on this one,” she says, patting her protruding stomach. In response, the bulge heaves and shifts, and I stare in horror. 

“What --? Is it okay?” My voice is full of alarm, but Delly just laughs.

“He’s just turning over,” she says, moving her hand to another spot. “He’s just about out of room in there.” Her eyes meet mine. “Do you want to feel?”

She’s smiling at me and holding out her hand, but I’m anxious to take it. I’ve never been comfortable around pregnant women. I guess they’re too much like the injured people my mother and sister would tend to, which makes no sense since pregnancy isn’t an illness, no matter what I feel like now. It was just unnerving, knowing that there was someone else inside of them, that they were so fragile and vulnerable. But a voice in my head reminds me, but you’re stuck now, and you’ll be there soon, so I put out a sweaty palm. She takes it and presses it to the side of her belly. I thought it would feel more solid, like a protective dome over what’s inside, but it’s surprisingly unresisting. We wait, and I feel awkward until something pushes back against my hand, and does so with shocking force. I gasp and look up at Delly.

“I felt it! He moved! Did it hurt?”

She chuckles. “No, but it can be uncomfortable. Life’s hard enough without having someone kick you from the inside.”

I nod my head, not really listening. I’m too absorbed in the feel of this other something pushing against my hand and thinking _This will be me. Peeta will get to feel this. There’s actually a person in there, in me._

“Katniss?”

“Hmm?”

She smiles and takes my hand and squeezes it.

“You’re going to be a great mother.”

I smile back, feeling tears spring to my eyes. “Thank you, Delly.”

“If you need anything --”

“I’ll visit a lot more, I think,” I tell her. “I’ll need your help on all of this.”

She smiles and we leave the fence, crossing over the Meadow without any somber thoughts. Both of us have family beneath the grass, but we are bristling with new life, like the dirt below us. We are flowers, Delly and I -- the sign of spring, of new life. I shake my head, my hand still buzzing with the feel of touching that new life, and I laugh to myself. I’m waxing poetic, turning into Peeta. Speaking of which...

“Hey Delly? Can I ask you something?”

“Anything.”

“How does your husband handle all of it? The... the emotional stuff, I mean.”

She laughs. “You mean the hormonal crazies?” I nod and she winks at me. “Oh, he just runs for cover to wait it out. Once a soldier from 13, always a soldier from 13. Our shed has become his bunker.”

We share a laugh and head back through the Square before parting. This pregnancy might make me crazy, but it might be more bearable now that I have someone else to help me through it.

I really want a cheese bun.


	4. Week 15

**Week 15**

I can’t sleep. 

It’s mid-May, humid, but the nights are still cool. The curtains flutter as a breeze crosses through the room, and while it feels good on my skin, it does nothing to lull me towards unconsciousness. I shift and roll onto my left side, trying to get comfortable, but I know it’s useless. The small of my back is cramping and while I’ve only just started to visibly show, I feel heavy and unbalanced. ‘Sloshy’ was the word Peeta offered when I tried to explain it to him, but what would he know? He’s passed out next to me, face relaxed and his mouth slightly open. One hand is resting on his stomach and his legs are tangled in the sheets and he’s probably dreaming of cakes or something while I’m tossing and turning and carrying his child --

I take a deep breath and exhale through my nose. It’s not his fault, I tell myself. Except that it is. I sigh again and throw the sheet off and slide out of bed. Peeta doesn’t even have a hitch in his snore. I roll my eyes and creep out of the room. 

I find my way down to the kitchen, my eyes adjusting to the dim flatness that the moon casts through the window panes. I make no sound, still light on my feet, and wince when the stairs creak a bit. Once in the kitchen I pour myself a glass of iced mint tea and stand before the sink window, looking out at the trees behind the house. Some of Haymitch’s geese have waddled into our yard; they look like fat ghosts in the moonlight. I sip my tea and shift from foot to foot, trying to ease the pain in the small of my back that is slowly radiating to the front of my pelvis. I’m used to it now. It’s a constant nuisance, and I’ve gotten good at ignoring it except for when I’m trying to sleep. I sigh and lay a hand on the slight swell of my womb. Even though there’s no movement yet, it’s strange how I feel like I can sense it there. It’s so hard to picture there being this little person inside of me, and yet I can feel the warmth of it there somehow. I set down my tea and place my other hand on the bump. In the moonlight I feel so different. Calm, for once. Peaceful, even, despite the cramps in my back. It’s actually nice.

“Katniss?”

I turn to the source of the gravelly voice standing in the doorway. His hair is smushed up on one side and his eyes are squinted as if the moon is too bright for him. He’s just in his sleep shorts, and he’s looking confused. “You weren’t in bed,” he says, sounding like a lost child. “I was worried. You okay?”

I nod, meeting his gaze across the room. He rubs at his eyes, and for a second I have a vision of a small blond boy, rubbing his eyes and wondering where his momma has gone. And then it’s Peeta again, 32 and watching me with a look that is only mine.

“Couldn’t sleep,” I say, and he nods, but the look on his face reveals much more. He moves towards me, slow and silent but for the click of his prosthetic foot on the floor. He stops before me, his blue eyes almost silver in the moonlight, and he brushes my hair off my shoulders, letting his hands come to rest on my collarbone. His fingertips tickle below my ear, and I lift my face to his. His eyes search mine, and then his lips descend, pressing against mine slowly, so slowly, and when he pulls away I sigh.

“What was that for?” I ask him, and his thumb traces my jaw.

“Because you’re beautiful,” he says, his voice still rough with sleep. His eyes are boring into mine as he continues, “You look like an angel, with the moon behind you.” His hand brushes against my belly and stays there, cradling.

I close my eyes with a sigh while his thumb caresses my cheek. “I love you,” I whisper, leaning into his hand. We stand there in the moonlight, just sharing breathing space. His hand is still on my belly and mine has joined it; our fingers interlace over the small pocket of life we have managed to create in the aftermath of so much darkness. When he kisses me again, I feel it to my toes -- the longing, the desire -- and I close the distance between us, releasing his hand to wrap my arm around his shoulders. His arms encircle my waist and our kiss deepens, and I realize that we haven’t done this in a while. My constant discomfort and the morning sickness had stood in the way. I hadn’t thought much of it, but Peeta must have. Guilt sweeps through me and I pull away. He frowns at me like I’ve woken him from a good dream.

“What?”

“I’m sorry, Peeta.”

His frown deepens. “For what?” He’s twisting the thin fabric of my nightgown in his hands, giving himself away. He had been thinking about it, then.

“For not wanting to have sex the last few weeks.”

His frown disappears with a laugh and a tightening of his arms around me. “Oh, that? I mean, it’s been a little hard to deal with --” and he waggles his eyebrows, making me roll my eyes, “-- but I didn’t really want you throwing up on me, so...”

I shake my head and he chuckles, keeping me close. “It’s okay, Katniss, really. I knew you weren’t feeling up to it, and I didn’t want to push you.”

I nod and run my fingers through his hair. He needs a haircut, but I love the curls around his ears and at the base of his neck. I want to brush them aside and kiss the skin beneath them.

“Well,” I say, ready to carry out my plan, “I’m feeling up to it now.”

His eyes spark and I feel him clench the nightgown in his hands. He raises an eyebrow, still trying to be nonchalant. “Are you, now?” he asks, and I nod, biting my bottom lip. His gaze drops, watching my mouth, and I’ve barely licked my lips before his meet mine in a staggering kiss. In one blow he has stoked the fire in me to a blaze, evidence of the fifteen years of experience between us. He is strong but gentle, dipping his tongue into my mouth but also massaging the small of my back, his fingers rubbing and prodding until the cramps start to ease and I am putty in his hands. 

I whimper against his mouth and then move my lips to his neck, kissing beneath his curls like I wanted to, nipping at his skin. I am rewarded with a deep sigh as his head falls to the side. His hands move, re-exploring terrain that he has mapped and memorized a million times but has now changed. My hips are wider, my breasts larger. My waist is starting to disappear, running me out of normal clothes and into ones that will fit over an expanding abdomen. I am rounder, fuller, though not quite done with my transformation. I can tell from his touch that I am different to him. He is always gentle, always reverent when he touches me, but now I am something entirely new for him to worship.

His lips find my shoulder, move to my collarbone, my sternum. Slowly his fingers move to the buttons of my nightgown, and he leaves kisses where each one comes undone until he is kneeling before me, laying a soft trail down across my belly. He urges me back against the counter with his kisses, and I shrug off my nightgown and lean against the cool marble. His mouth moves lower, his hands gripping my hips until he uses one to hook my leg over his shoulder. I sigh when I feel him press his lips _there,_ my whole body relaxing. I had no idea how badly I’d needed this, needed him. He lavishes kisses on my center, and I twine my fingers into his hair and my head falls back, eyes shut.

“Peeta...”

I can feel him smirk, and I look down at him, brushing the waves of his hair from his forehead. His eyes open and meet mine, and he pulls away and takes my hands and gently pulls me to his level. A smile flits across my lips. We haven’t made love on the kitchen floor in a long time.

He lowers me to the hardwood with lingering kisses, and somewhere along the way he loses his underwear and my hand finds him and he sucks in a deep breath. For all his talent with words, Peeta is generally incapable of speech by this point, and I grin as he groans against my lips while I touch him.

I feel wild and calm at the same time, desperate for him and patiently waiting. It’s bizarre, almost out-of-body, and then he settles between my legs. My body hums in anticipation, but he is frozen. I open my eyes to find him staring at me.

“What is it?”

He’s almost sheepish as he asks, “This, uh... it’s not gonna hurt the baby, is it?”

That gives me pause. I hadn’t thought about it before.

“Dr. Bryke hasn’t said not to...” I tell him. “I don’t think so...”

“Good,” he says, and leans in to kiss me. “Because I don’t want to stop.”

I laugh and he smirks against the hollow of my neck and then he is inside of me, hard and urgent. I gasp at the invasion, shifting to take him deeper. I am surprised at how close I feel already, and I distantly wonder if it’s the hormones. But for all of his talk of not wanting to stop, Peeta is gentle, and I think he’s honestly concerned that he’ll somehow hurt the baby. It’s sweet, but it isn’t doing much for me. My blood is racing and I want _more._

“Peeta,” I sigh as he moves in me, “Please, I need...” And as I say the word he seems to have already read my mind, and he moves within me the way I want him to. 

In a distant part of my mind that isn’t wholly occupied with Peeta, I marvel at this moment: how we can still love each other like this after so many years, how he can still stoke the fire within me to a roaring blaze. That we can come to each other despite everything and make love like there’s nothing outside of us, that there is only we two, clinging and desperate for something that only the other can give.

And then without realizing it, he brings me to the edge and over before following himself. My pulse deafens me, and I am dimly aware of Peeta lazily peppering kisses on my face and neck and breasts, and when he reaches my lips I am giddy from sensation. The world is hazy, like a dream.

“Real or not real?” I murmur, unaware that I’ve done so. I feel Peeta nuzzle my cheek and he rolls to the side, reaching out to pull me to him. I wrap my limbs around him, doing what I can to keep this feeling close. Peeta smooths my hair back and kisses my forehead.

“That’s my line,” he says. “But real.”

I smile and unwind myself from him. “Good. I’m so exhausted, it was hard to tell.”

He chuckles and we pull each other to our feet, stretching and working out the kinks that the floor has given us. He picks our night clothes up off the floor. “Let’s go clean up and go back to bed. You’re not the only one who’s exhausted.”

I roll my eyes but don’t bother to take my nightgown from him. Let him stare as I walk up the stairs before him, with my ass in his face and the evidence of our love-making running down between my legs. I feel wild, unrestrained. Like moonlight. Fleeting and free from what was holding me down. I laugh and turn to the hall, padding away on silent feet, beckoning with my body. I hear Peeta follow after a moment, and I bask in the power the moon has given me.

\------------------

The next day I wake up to Peeta wafting a plate of breakfast under my nose. I grumble at the intrusion, but my stomach growls at the prospect of food, and it smells delicious, so I crack open my eyes and find my husband holding a tray.

“Wake up, Sleeping Queen,” he urges playfully. “You've got a busy day.”

I groan again but eventually sit up. The tray has eggs – once again edible now that the morning sickness has passed – and a few slices of thick, dark bread with an assortment of jams and jellies and butter laid out next to it. What has really caught my attention, though, are the pieces of bacon he's cooked. The train came in yesterday, bringing us new supplies, and bacon was one of them. My stomach loudly makes its hunger known. Peeta laughs and places the tray on my lap.

“Vitamins first,” he says, and hands me a little cup and a glass of water. I eye the pills with disdain. I hate taking pills. Drugs of any kind remind me too much of being in a hospital, helpless and hopeless. But these aren't drugs. They're vitamins. Dr. Bryke said I should take them, to make sure that the baby stays healthy and grows properly. Still, I swallow them down like they're poison, and immediately chase them down with a large bite of crispy bacon. My mouth waters.

“This is so good,” I say around the mouthful. “What's the occasion?”

Peeta shrugs and takes a piece of bacon for himself, munching on it silence until he comes up with a reason. He doesn't really need one. I would gladly accept breakfast in bed every day if he didn't wake me up so early.

“Well, last night, for one,” he says, and I blush and grin at the same time. He smirks back. “And two, we have a doctor appointment today. The ultrasound thing?”

The morning fog suddenly clears from my brain. “Oh! Right. This afternoon.” Our first ultrasound. Dr. Bryke said that the machine had arrived from the capitol only a few days ago, and she was eager for us to come in. The way she explained it, it took video of the baby while it was inside of me, but I'm unsure of the exact details; Capitol technology will always be strange to me. Still, the idea of being able to see our baby before it's born has me excited. But I have other things to do before the appointment, namely getting new clothes that will actually fit.

So far I've only gained about eight pounds, and it baffles me that such a small number can make such a change to my body. Barely any of my clothes fir anymore. Delly had been kind enough to lend me a pair of pants until the train came in, and yesterday it delivered a parcel of maternity clothes to Delly's house. I'm going by later to pick them up. She had agreed to place the order for me, to avoid any suspicion from the Capitol. Katniss Everdeen purchasing maternity wear? It'd be all over the news. And that's not how I want my friends in other districts to find out. The very thought of it makes me cringe. Which is why I have agreed to Peeta's suggestion of calling those friends and telling them. Starting today.

That honestly makes me cringe, too.

I decide to kill the feeling with more bacon. Peeta chuckles.

“I know you're not supposed to have a lot of that,” he says, nodding towards the slices still on the plate, “but it just came in, so...”

I smirk at him. “I won't tell if you don't.”

He smirks and leans forward to give me a kiss. “Just make sure you eat the rest of it, too. I'm going to take a shower. Don't stay in bed too long.” He kisses me again and gets up to leave the room. I watch him go, no longer occupied by my food. My mind has turned to other subjects, like Peeta standing naked under a stream of hot water –

I catch myself, frowning slightly. I feel warm, and I don't know if it's because I'm embarassed at how randomly my mind went to sex, or because of how urgently I want to have sex with him. Right now. I almost laugh out loud. Dr. Bryke had said that my second trimester would be the best. I didn't know that included increased sex drive as well. I take a moment to weigh the options. Sit here eating breakfast, or surprise my husband in the shower? It isn't much of a contest.

I grab one more piece of bacon and slip out of bed, not bothering to put any other clothes on. I'm wearing one of Peeta's shirts and it falls just barely to the tops of my thighs. I'm quickly becoming used to feeling so mischievous. I think Peeta is enjoying it, too, since it's so... not me. I tiptoe down the hall to the bathroom, nudging open the door that he has left cracked open. I am greeted with steam, and when it starts to clear I catch a glimpse of Peeta's bare backside, still taut and firm after all these years. I used to blush when I saw him naked, even after we'd become intimate, but in the fifteen years I've been with him, I've gotten used to it, and have come to enjoy stolen glances when he doesn't know I'm looking. Like now. I shake my head. I could have an arrow aimed point blank at his skull and he wouldn't know I was in the room. He's humming to himself, something that might be an actual song but is lost in Peeta's throat. I smile. He never could carry a tune, even if he had a bucket.

I pull the shirt over my head and slip into the shower, pressing my bare body against his and making him jump.

“Good morning,” I say, practically purring. The water is deliciously warm, and so is he. Peeta turns in my arms and gives me a long, wet kiss.

“Morning,” he replies, his voice low. “This is a nice surprise.”

I smirk and pull his lips to mine. The appointment isn't until this afternoon. We can afford to spend a little time being unproductive.

\---------------------------------------------

“Here.” Peeta holds the receiver out to me. I back away, shaking my head.

“I can't.”

“Well, it's ringing, so you kind of have to --”

I shake my head again. I couldn't even bring myself to dial the number. He expects me to be able to actually speak?

“She won't pick up, you know that --”

But of course, to spite me, I hear the ringing stop and a female voice say 'hello.' Peeta raises an eyebrow and brandishes the phone again. I glare at him and snatch it from his hand.

“Hi. Johanna?”

“Katniss? Holy shit.”

I laugh nervously and Peeta raises an eyebrow again, this time in curiosity. I wave him away. “Yes, it's me. Um, how have you been?” I don't know why I'm bothering with small talk. If there's anyone in this world with whom I can dispense of the small talk, it would be Johanna Mason.

“Lousy as usual. Why'd you call?” Her forwardness I take for curiosity. She means well. I think.

“Well, um, Peeta and I had something to tell you.”

“Okay?”

I hesitate. Peeta takes my hand and squeezes it, and I take a deep breath.

“I'm pregnant,” I squeak, then I clear my throat and repeat, “We're gonna have a baby.”

Peeta grins at me, forever delirious at hearing those words, but there is silence on the other end. I begin to panic. 

“Johanna?”

“Holy shit, Katniss,” she finally says. “Congratulations. I mean, I guess that's what I'm supposed to say, right? That's... wow, that's great.”

I frown a bit. Her voice is flat. I honestly thought she'd be a little excited.

“Johanna... is everything alright?”

She clears her throat and I imagine her scowling. “I'm fine. Just can't believe you finally gave in, is all. What the hell happened to you and me refusing to open up shop?”

I laugh again, a little less nervous and a little more genuine. “Well, you know how Peeta is. Good with words and all.”

“That's not all I'm good with,” he chirps, and I hear Johanna gag.

“Oh my god, Peeta, seriously?” She gags again, though I think she might be faking it. Peeta chuckles at the glare I give him.

“Sorry,” I tell her. “He thinks he's hilarious. But don't let him fool you, he cried when we found out.” Johanna laughs at that. It's good to hear her laugh.

“Well, congrats and all that,” she says. “And thanks for calling, I guess.”

“Of course. Just, don't go telling anyone yet --”

“Who do I have to tell? I assume you've already called Beetee and Annie and whoever else.”

“Well...”

She laughs again. “Oh, this is good. But don't worry, Mockingjay, I won't tell.”

My brows draw together at the nickname, but I ignore it. “Thank you. Well, I'll talk to you later okay?”

“All right. Oh, and Katniss?”

“Mmhm?”

“I'd better get a picture of this thing when it's out.”

I chuckle. “Of course. Bye.”

She hangs up the phone and I put the receiver back in its cradle. Peeta watches me carefully.

“See? That wasn't so bad,” he says, and I shrug.

“She was one of the easy ones. Beetee will be okay, and I want to call Annie, but she's so close to my mother, and Gale...”

He clucks me under the chin. “Hey. Don't worry about it. I'll call Beetee, and when the time's right you'll tell your mom. And Gale, if you want.” I frown at him, because he knows that I can't decide which one will be worse to tell. 

“I'm going to Delly's,” I say. “I'll see you at the clinic?” He smiles and kisses me in a way that makes my stomach flutter. 

“I can't wait,” he says, and I'd have to agree.

\-------------------------------------------------

Delly holds up the first article of clothing from the box shipped from out-of-district. I turn up my nose at the floral print.

“I hope that one is yours,” I tell her, and she laughs.

“I would never fit in it! I hope you don't mind, but I ordered a few dresses for you.” She must not see my frown, because she goes on like I don't mind at all. “You'll want them when the summer sets in. You'll be heavier then and trust me, you won't want to be wearing shorts.”

I seriously doubt that, since I dislike dresses and always have, but I appreciate her thoughtfulness. She's most likely right, anyway. She's the one that's pregnant with her fourth child. I look out the open window to observe the other three, who are chasing each other around the small garden out back, laughing and screaming in delight. The youngest, a girl named Reeva, trips and begins to cry, red faced and tears streaming down her round cheeks. Immediately Delly is at the window, poking her head out to call to the older two, “Didn't I tell you boys to watch your sister? Bring her inside.”

The boys, about seven and five and plain-faced like their mother, duck their heads and scamper back to their sister, who is still on the ground crying. The older boy, Mickey, lifts her up and brings her towards the house, while Vance follows behind. Delly takes the little girl from them when they come in and sends them right back out, shushing and rocking at the same time. I'm almost in awe. When Reeva calms down, I ask Delly, “How do you do it?”

She looks at me like she's almost forgotten I was here. “Do what?”

I shrug and gesture towards the girl in her arms and the boys running in the backyard again. “All of this,” I say. “I wouldn't have known the first thing to do.”

She smiles at me. “Oh, Katniss. It's easy. Being a mother is the one thing that just comes naturally.” She readjusts the little girl and sits down on the small sofa next to me. I watch the toddler on her lap, and Delly smiles again. 

“Here,” she says, “hold her and I'll go get us a cup of tea.” And then she is placing Reeva on my lap and walking away. I freeze in panic.

'Hold' wasn't the word Delly should have used. 'Watch' would have been more appropriate, since that is what this little girl is doing to me. She sits on my lap and stares with her large brown eyes, and I stare back. She scares me to death.

“Hi,” she says, and then she begins to babble nonsense at me, pointing and clapping occasionally. I have no idea what to do, so I just nod and say, “really?” This apparently pleases her, and she continues with her story until she decides that I am clearly not the attentive listener she thought, and she starts to call for Delly.

“Ma ma ma,” she says, looking around the room and then turning back to me like I've hidden her mother. “Ma ma ma ma ma?”

“She's in the kitchen,” I tell her, feeling stupid for talking to someone who can't even respond, but she smiles at me and babbles some more nonsense and then squirms out of my lap and stumbles toward the kitchen on chubby bowlegs. A stream of giggles and 'mamama' follows her, and I leap up to chase her down.

“Reeva, come back!” I tell her, but she evades my reach and runs into the kitchen. I manage to scoop her up before she barrels into her mother, who is holding two cups of hot tea.

“Mama!” Reeva squeals, throwing up her hands even as I lift her into my arms. She settles easily against my hip, and Delly smirks. 

“See?” she says, handing me a cup. “Completely natural.”

\-------------------------------------------------------

I don't really know what I was expecting the machine to look like. I assumed there would be lots of wires, that I would be hooked up with needles or sensory nodes. Instead, Dr. Bryke shows Peeta and I into a dimly lit room with an examination table and a cart with a small television screen and control board on it, as well as what looks like a printer. I'm wondering if this is just a preliminary test when she asks me to lay on the table and undo the top of my pants. Peeta's eyes meet mine, and I think he might me chuckling at me, so I stick my elbow in his ribs before loosening my new maternity pants and climbing up on to the exam table. Dr. Bryke is all smiles.

“Now, if you'll just lay back and lift up your shirt – there we are.” She clicks a few buttons on the machine and the screen flickers to life, glowing black and white in the dimness of the exam room. I look over at Peeta, who has taken a seat next to the table and find he is starting warily at the machine. For all that Capitol medicine has done for us – namely saving our lives – we are still cautious with it. Maybe it's because we're still working on providing adequate medical care in District 12 while those in the Capitol surgically alter their appearance every other day, or maybe because we still loathe anything about the place even after all these years; neither of us could really say. I try to tell myself that this piece of technology can do nothing but good, that it will somehow let us see our baby before it's born, but I'm anxious as always. I take Peeta's hand and he gives mine a squeeze. He's thinking the same things I am. 

“How will this show us the baby?” he asks, sounding perfectly calm, even curious. Of course, that part is genuine – he's confused on how it works. So am I. Dr. Bryke smiles again and picks up a small hand-sized bulb of plastic that is attached to the machine by a cord. 

“This uses sound to show us an image of what is inside you, in this case a fetus.” She picks up a bottle of clear fluid and opens it up. “This is a lubricant. I'll put it on your belly, and then I'll move the sensor around on your skin to get the picture. Does that make sense?”

Peeta and I exchange a look. “That's all?” I ask, baffled, but feeling relieved. That was all. Nothing in my skin, no poking or prodding outside of her touching my abdomen. Dr. Bryke laughs.

“Yes, that's all. Now hold your top up a little more. I'm going to put this on your stomach, and it's going to be cold.”

She wasn't joking. I yelp, and Peeta laughs. Dr. Bryke just smirks as she squeezes the gel onto my belly, and then she takes the sensor and pushes it against my gut, smearing the gel around. The screen explodes with a tumble of grey and white, and then something appears and disappears. Dr. Bryke mutters something like, “Where are you, little one?” and then it is there, the outline of a head, a strip of white that is the spine, a flutter of movement...

“Oh!”

At first, it doesn't look real, this odd, slightly humanoid thing that is wriggling inside of me. But then, like a warm quilt settling over me, I begin to see: the high, round shape of the head; the profile of the face; the thumb near its mouth. The legs kick, and I can't tell if I feel it or not. Peeta shifts next to me, and I manage to tear my eyes away long enough o look at him. Awe is etched on his features, erasing the stress lines our lives have left around his eyes and on his brow. He is captivated, unblinking, and tears are beginning to pool in his eyes. He notices me watching him, and his gaze flicks to mine. The awe is still there, but this time it is for me alone. It is the look he gave me when we first kissed in the cave, when I first let him come back to me as more than a friend. The look he wore when I told him I loved him, when we married, when we made love the night before. It is the face he wears when I have given him his heart’s desire and he is so grateful, like he doesn't believe he deserves it. I smile at him, tears beginning to prick my eyes, and he leans over to kiss me, our fingers intertwined.

“I'm just going to take a few measurements,” Dr. Bryke says quietly. Peeta and I separate and glue our eyes back to the screen.

“The head is growing properly,” she tells us, clicking a few buttons and manipulating the sensor at the same time. “You can see the eye here --” and she points to the dark circle on its face just where the eye would be. “About four and a quarter inches long in total. Your baby is developing nicely.”

“That flicker,” Peeta pipes up, “in the chest, is that –?”

“Yes, that's the heart.” Her face splits into a grin. “Would you like to hear it?”

We nod, Peeta rapidly, I in stunned silence. I am staring at the baby's profile, looking for signs of a face, when it shifts and turns its head slightly, almost as if to look at me. I gasp, and Peeta clutches my hand, while Dr. Bryke clicks a button, making the image freeze for a moment before returning to real time. She then clicks another key, and the room is suddenly filled with the rushing whoosh of our child's heartbeat.

My breath catches in my throat. 

Perhaps it hadn't really sunk in until now. I could feel no movement, was only vaguely aware of another presence within me. I had been plagued by nausea and back pain and restless nights, and had known what they were symptoms of, but it had not registered that there was really another person in there until now.

“It's so fast,” I whisper. “Is that okay?”

“Perfectly normal,” Dr. Bryke assures me, and turns the sound off. My ears feel achingly empty without it.

“Alright now. Would you like to know the baby's gender?”

Peeta's eyebrows shoot up. “You can tell this early?”

“Usually.” She moves the sensor across my belly, prodding for a better view. “There's a foot there --” she freezes the image again for a moment, “-- and here's the thigh bone...” She prods a little more, frowning in concentration. “But it looks like your baby might be a little shy...”

Peeta laughs as I smile, and I fix him with a look. “Do we want to know?” I ask him. He shrugs, thought excitement pours off of him in waves.

“I think it's going to be a girl, but it's up to you if you want to find out now.”

I raise my brows in surprise. “You do?”

He looks at me like it's been obvious. “Well yeah. Don't you? Not that a boy would be bad, but I just think it's a girl.”

I've never heard him say any of this before, and hearing him say it gets me thinking, because I haven't really thought about it. At all.

“I think it'd be a nice surprise, you know?” he continues. “But it's up to you.” He squeezes my hand, and I absently squeeze back. Do I want to know? There was no way to tell before the war whether the baby would even make it or not, let alone if it were a boy or girl. It hadn't mattered. To be honest, I don't really think it matters now.

“I don't want to know,” I say. “I don't need to know. It's not important.”

He smiles, and Dr. Bryke nods. “Seems like sound logic to me. I'll just print out some images for you to take home...”

Peeta stands and kisses my forehead as Dr. Bryke wipes off my stomach. She tells me that she's want to check a few more things before we leave – my weight, my diet, my blood pressure – so Peeta goes to sit in the waiting room while she does this. I pull down my shirt as he shuts the door, and Dr. Bryke takes a seat on her stool again after wheeling the ultrasound cart towards the wall.

“So how are you feeling?” she asks. It's not a question I'm fond of, but Dr. Bryke is the only doctor I've met that I'm willing to so easily divulge information. I shrug.

“All right. Tired.”

“Difficulty sleeping?”

I smirk. “Between the discomfort and Peeta snoring...” We laugh, and then I sigh and mumble, “I feel... good. For the first time in a long time.”

She nods, fixing a look at me with her green eyes. “I contacted Dr. Aurelius the other day to inquire about any previous conditions --”

“You didn't tell him, did you?” Panic wells up inside of me. He lives in the Capitol. If he tells anyone –

“Of course not. Your pregnancy is none of his concern.” She pats my hand. “I was just requesting that your medical records be sent to me, since I'm now your primary physician.”

I relax a bit and nod. That makes sense, I guess, but now my nerves are crawling. Dr. Bryke crosses her legs and leans forward a bit, clearing her throat. “I wanted to ask about your mental health, Katniss,” she says, her eyes unjudging. “I know that you've experienced great suffering, and I can see that you still deal with it. It's important that we make sure your mental health is being looked after just as much as your physical health.”

I honestly don't know what to say. I haven't felt that way in a while. I know it will come, but I hadn't thought about it at all until now. It has me shaking in moments.

“I don't – that can't happen anymore,” I tell her, my voice hard. “I can't have a baby and then shut down, I won't --”

Dr. Bryke takes my hand. “I'm not saying it will, Katniss. I just want to make sure that we're being cautious. You're experiencing a lot of hormone fluctuation right now, so it's best if we keep an eye on it.” Her voice softens as she looks me in the eyes. “This is an exciting time, and I'm going to make sure we do all we can to keep it that way.”

I nod, biting my lower lip. I feel myself start to close up, a subconscious reaction to someone prying, to someone wanting to get inside my head. Only Peeta is allowed there, and even then he still only gets glimpses. It is territory I don't even like treading. But I know that she's right. It could come back at any time, that hell I used to live in. And now I'm terrified. 

“Are we done?” I ask, unable to help sounding sharp. Dr. Bryke purses her lips, the first time I've ever seen her without a smile.

“I'd encourage you to tell Peeta about this,” she says, and I nod again and stand. She stands with me and hands me the images she had printed out. I take them but don't look. My mind is too busy reeling. 

Peeta is sitting in the waiting room, his good leg bouncing restlessly. The receptionist – the girl from the Capitol – is eyeing him, and along with the conspiratorial look is what I think is lust, and my rage flares. I surge forward and grab his hand, yanking him to his feet. He had been all smiles until I did this, and now he's asking if everything's okay. I just kiss him and glare at the receptionist.

“Let's go home,” I tell him, trying to keep my voice sweet, and though he sees right through it, he smiles and leads me to the door. Once we're out in the sun, he starts asking, and I quietly tell him what Dr. Bryke said. He's silent until we reach our front door.

“Do you think you might?” he asks quietly, not meeting my eyes. He's running the possibilities through his head. All I can do is shrug.

“I don't know. You know how it is, it just shows up...”

He nods. This is our dirty little secret. I still disappear into the dark recesses of my nightmares, he still fights with himself over what is real and what's not. It's not as frequent as it used to be. Sometimes it's only flashes that we don't even bother getting upset about anymore. Sometimes, I will stay in bed for days and sleep, choosing oblivion over the thought of getting up and facing the day. Sometimes he will close down the bakery for no reason and try not to destroy the interior as he fights the tracker jacker venom that still lingers in his veins. There is rarely an identifiable trigger. Some days are just better than others. This has been our life together, building scaffolding under the weak spots and hoping they hold up as we try to see the beauty in the remaining architecture. Though we are no longer living day to day, we are both aware of the darkness that still lingers in ourselves and each other. But we haven't let it win yet.

“I haven't felt that way in a while, Peeta,” I tell him, moving in to lay my head on his chest. The sound of his heartbeat calms me down. I'm afraid of it happening, but I know it won't. He will keep me here. Him and the baby.

He lays his cheek against the top of my head, and I can feel his smile. “Good to hear,” he whispers. We stand there for a moment holding each other in silence, until our neighbor interrupts us.

“Would you two knock it the fuck off?”

Peeta and I turn to find Haymitch walking toward his door with a small wagon in tow that is stacked high with boxes. Haymitch never gets that much liquor off of the train. I frown. What else did he order?

“What are you doing up?” Peeta shouts, and I nod. What the hell is he doing up? It's only late afternoon; he usually sleeps till nine.

“The hell does it look like I'm doing up?” He gestures to his pull-along wagon. I'm starting to wonder which child he knicked it from, while Peeta frowns and begins to walk toward him. I follow grudgingly.

“That can't all me liquor,” Peeta says, and Haymitch rolls his eyes. 

“There's food, too, you idiot. I gotta eat, in case you forgot.”

“It's too much for food, too,” I quip. Haymitch shoots me his customary glare that I easily ignore. “What else did you get?”

“None of your damn business, sweetheart,” he snaps. “But since ya asked, help me get this shit inside.”

It's not a question, but Peeta shrugs and picks up two boxes and heads to the door. I grab one, only to see what's in it, but it clanks like it's full of liquor bottles. Typical. I put that box back and pick up another. This one is light and makes no noise. What on earth did he get?

“You gonna stand there and snoop through my shit all day?”

I toss a glare in Haymitch’s direction as he walks towards me. Peeta isn't far behind, wearing a confused expression.

“What is all this?” I ask again. Haymitch doesn't respond. When I look at Peeta, he shrugs at me.

“I got the rest,” Haymitch says. “Get outta my hair, dammit.”

Peeta shakes his head in bewilderment. “Suit yourself. But why don't you come over for dinner? We can show you the pictures from the ultrasound.”

Haymitch stops and considers for a moment. “Or... you can show me the stupid things now so as I don't have to come by later and can get back to drinking now.”

I roll my eyes and thrust the images at him. He might as well stick his tongue out at me, the look he gives me is so childish. “I didn't want you over for dinner, anyway,” I mutter, and Peeta giggles and gives me a look that says, _Who's being childish?_ I try not to scowl. 

“It looks like a damn fish.”

“What the hell are you talking about?” I grab the images from him and start pointing out the features. “That's her head, and her nose, that's her foot – and in this one she's looking right at the camera!”

When I look up, both Haymitch and Peeta are smirking at me.

“'Her', huh?” Haymitch asks. “Just what we need, another you...”

“We don't know if it's a girl,” I say, sheepishly ducking my head. “I just... got excited.”

Haymitch shakes his head and snatches the pictures from me. “Whatever. Which one do I get to keep?”

“Keep?” I try to snatch them back. “You don't get to keep any of them!”

He evades me and takes a picture from the rest, holding it out to see. “Ha, this one looks like she's givin' me the bird. Just like her mother.” He stuffs the image into his shirt pocket before I can retrieve it and hands me the rest. I look to Peeta in exasperation, but he has his hand over his mouth, trying not to burst out laughing.

“You're just as bad as he is!” I snap, and Peeta loses it. He doubles over with laughter, and Haymitch shakes his head.

“Boy's soft in the head, I've been sayin' it for years...”

“Take your shit and go home, Haymitch,” I tell him. “Dinner's at seven.”

\------------------------------------------------------------

Peeta and I sit on the couch, looking at the pictures from the ultrasound. Haymitch left hours ago, after we had finished a dinner of rabbit stew. After he'd gone, we took to the living room, settling on the sofa with the images and cups of tea. I curled my feet under me and Peeta pulled me close to his side, and we bent out heads and wondered at the little alien thing the pictures in our hands showed us. We tried to imagine what it would be, who it would be, and though I was happy, excited, I could not stop the pit of anxiety that had opened up in my stomach. It was safe for now, nestled within the warm protection of my womb, but what about when it was born? I could not keep it safe then, no matter how hard I tried. Suddenly, I was overcome with the fierce desire to keep my child within me forever, where I knew it was safe and sound. It was the best possible way to keep it protected. But I didn't let Peeta know. After a while, when I had already memorized all of the little smudges of black and white and grey that was our child, I began to watch my husband instead. There have been moments over the years where I catch myself falling in love with him all over again; this could be one of those moments. He is childlike in his joy, in his awe and amazement at the little thing that he is looking at. That this thing is part of him and part of me put into one person. That this child is really his. I cannot help but smile. For that smile, I would bring him the moon. 

“I hope she looks like you,” he whispers. I scowl at him, if only because it is so absurd.

“I hope not. I want our baby to look like you.” Like Prim, my mind finishes, and the chasm yawns open a little wider. I choke on the lump in my throat, and Peeta tightens his arm around me.

“I miss them, too,” he breathes, and that is when I let the tears fall. I know he is crying, too, and we hold onto each other and the images of our baby, pain and joy mingling in our hearts.


	5. Weeks 19 to 21

**Week 19**

“Have you thought about names yet?”

I shake my head at Delly and continue to sift through the box she has set in front of me. It’s full of baby things – clothes, diapers, bottles, towels, bibs… She’s going through another box filled with the same stuff, but she’s finding it difficult to lean over. She’s offered to lend me some of her children’s old things, but I think she’ll need them before me. She looks like she’s about to pop. 

“No,” I say, setting aside a pair of tiny socks – November will be cold. “We don’t even know if it will be a boy or a girl.”

“Oh, I went to see Dr. Bryke the other day about where I’ll deliver and she did that ultrasound on me and asked if I wanted to know.” She shrugs. “It was a surprise for the last three, so I figured why not?” She smiles. “We’re having another boy.”

I have to smile back. “That’s great, Delly. I’m sure Rolan is happy.”

“Oh, I don’t think he minds one way or the other,” she says, folding up a receiving blanket and setting it aside. “Being from 13 and all.”

I nod and pull a onesie from the box and begin to fold it. It’s really a miracle that he and Delly have had so many children, considering that so much of 13’s population is sterile due to the pox epidemic they had. Rolan was one of the lucky few. He’d told Peeta once that the scientists of 13 that were in charge of sustaining the population had used him as a donor. I knew that meant he might have other children back in his own district, but Delly didn’t seem to care.

“What do you think it will be?” she asks me. I pause in my folding.

“Peeta is convinced it’s a girl,” I say, “But me… I don’t honestly know.” My hand drifts to my rounded belly. “I’m still trying to wrap my head around there being a person in there.”

Delly laughs. “I don’t think it’s something you get used to.” She rubs her distended belly and I see it roil slightly as the baby boy shifts inside of her. She grimaces slightly. “You certainly start wanting them out soon enough. This one’s had his feet in my guts all day.”

I laugh and dig through the box some more, finding myself being pulled into my thoughts. Delly goes on about needing new shoes for Vance and Mickey, and I’m only half listening when I feel the flutter.

“What is it?” Delly’s face is full of concern at my gasp until she sees the hand that is on my stomach. “Did it move?”

I am completely baffled. “I don’t know. What’s it supposed to feel like?”

She grins and moves to sit beside me. “Like gas, early on. Or a flutter. You’re so thin, I’m surprised you haven’t felt it sooner.” I nod blankly, focused on the slight flutter I feel low in my belly.

“I guess… I thought it was indigestion,” I say sheepishly. Have I really been missing the baby’s first movements? Peeta will be so upset…

“It’s okay if you didn’t know, Katniss,” she tells me. “With Mickey I thought it was gas at first, too. It was just flutters, right?” I nod, and she nods back. “When I was pregnant with Vance I knew what it was right away. Now that you know, you won’t miss it. But it’s easier to feel when you’re still.”

I start to smile, pressing both hands into my stomach. _Hello_ , I think inwardly. _Hello, little one._ I feel another flutter, and tears prick my eyes. But all at once I am consumed with terror and the smile leaves my face. Now it is real. There is no going back.

“Oh, Delly…”

She puts her arms around me and hugs me tight, and I start to laugh, slightly hysteric. She knows I’m here, I can feel her and she knows… Distantly I wonder at how I think the baby is a girl only in these highly emotional moments. I think it’s Peeta’s fault. Peeta…

“I have to tell Peeta!” I jump up and gather all of the things I had set aside and stuff them into an empty box. “I’ll come back for these tomorrow, okay?”

Delly just smiles and shakes her head. “Go on. Just don’t run!”

I ignore her and take off out the door. Delly and Rolan live on the outskirts of what was once the merchant quarter of the district, so it’s not too far to the Square and the shops. It’s too awkward to run, and hurts, in fact, so I walk as fast as I can to the bakery, my stomach fluttering with excitement. When I reach the steps I stop and peek in the window to watch Peeta behind the counter. The smile on his face as he kneads dough on the counter while chatting with a customer melts my heart.

I love this man.

I open the door and step inside. His head snaps my way as the bell above my head tinkles my arrival. His face splits into a grin, but he continues his conversation with the customer. I smile at him and go behind the counter to the kitchen and wait. I know it won’t take long, but I help myself to a cranberry muffin that is cooling on one of the racks and nibble on it contentedly. My hand rests on my belly, craving the feel of another movement, even though I know I don’t need my hand to feel it. Pressing my hand against my skin, trying to touch my baby before I truly can – it makes me feel safe and like I’m keeping the baby safe, too. It helps quell the fear that has started leaking thought the cracks. I hum to keep myself occupied, the tune that I remembered at the cabin. The words are still absent, but the tune is there. I sing it to the baby as I wait. 

“Hey, what’s going on?” Peeta shuts the door behind him and raises his eyebrows at me. He is covered in flour and I have to smile. Without saying anything, I take his hand and press it to my belly. The baby has been doing steady somersaults, nothing jarring or uncomfortable like Delly described, but I suppose that that will come later. For now it is just a flutter here or there, a shift. The excitement begins to transform into a sense of calm awareness. Peeta is staring at me in disbelief.

“Did you feel her move?” he asks in a rush, his voice brimming with eagerness. He lifts my shirt and lays his floury hands against my bare skin, sinking down to his knees to get on level with my navel. He looks up at me like an excited little boy. “Where do I –“

I shush him and move his hands to where I felt it last. When the baby doesn’t do anything right away, he starts to frown.

“I don’t feel anything –“

“Shh. It’s because it’s not moving. Just wait.”

So he does. And the baby has decided that it’s comfortable where it’s at. After another minute, I frown.

“It was dancing in there earlier, I swear –“

Peeta laughs and says, “Well maybe she’s shy like her mother.” He leans forward and places a kiss on my belly and begins to speak in a low voice. “Hey in there. It’s your dad.” I can see him swallow, and I have to bite my lip to keep myself from starting to cry. Stupid hormones…

“Why won’t you say hi to me?” he continues. “I can’t wait to meet you. Your mother can’t wait to meet you.” He kisses my belly again, and I grip one of his hands in my own.

“Won’t you just say hello?” I say. Peeta grins.

“Stubborn, too.”

“Didn’t get it from me,” I mutter, and Peeta laughs. When he stops, he freezes. His eyes are wide when he looks at me. “Did she –“ I nod, grinning at his excitement. “I felt it, she moved, I could feel it –“ He kisses the spot where the baby had moved and whispers to her, “Hello, little bird…”

I feel like my heart will burst from the the amount of love I have for this man. “She must like your laugh,” I say.

That’s something she did get from me.

\-----------------------------

**Week 20**

I wake sometime after noon. The sun is bright thru the bedroom window, and I can hear Haymitch’s geese honking next door. I groan and roll over, wanting to shut out the light. I do not feel well at all.

I end up spending most of the day in bed. I have nothing planned, but that rarely justifies laziness for me. But I see no reason to get up.

And that begins to frighten me.

I hear Peeta come in the front door and I am flooded with guilt. He has been working all day and I have done nothing. I pull myself out of bed to get dressed, but he makes it upstairs before I can. He frowns at my appearance.

“Katniss?”

I thing about crying. He’s upset and it’s my fault, but I can’t. I just feel the guilt weigh me down.

“I’m sorry Peeta,” I mumble, and he wraps his arms around me tight.

“What happened? You wouldn’t get out of bed this morning.” He twists the end of my braid anxiously. “I didn’t hear you have any nightmares.”

I shake my head, utterly exhausted despite my sedentary afternoon. “Today just wasn’t my day.”

He nods but doesn’t let me go. “Will you be alright?”

I shrug. This is always the answer I give him. I’ll never know until I wake up the next morning.

“I think I’ll take a bath,” I tell him, and he nods, saying he’ll run the water for me while I get undressed. When he leaves, I undo my braid and pull off my pyjamas and look at myself in the mirror. I just look tired, thankfully. My belly is round and full and my waistline has nearly disappeared. I look good and pregnant; everyone will be able to tell now. My stomach churns at the thought.

Peeta has the tub full of steaming water that is sending tendrils of steam into the hall. I smell lavender and mint, and the soft glow of candlelight is easy on my eyes, which have been aching from a headache. He is sitting on the edge of the tub, looking up at me with anxiety written all over his face. His foot is tapping, and I know he is very likely close to having an episode. Sometimes that happens – my bad days can trigger his. I take a deep breath and go to him, and he wraps his arms around my middle, pressing his forehead against my belly. I rest my hands on his shoulders, curl my fingers against the base of his skull, and it makes me want to shake, too.

I nudge him towards the bath, and he nods and takes my hand to help me down into the aromatic water, sighing heavily as Peeta pulls his shirt over his head. I can tell from the way he stretches that he’s been lifting heavy things today and because of it he is feeling his age. He eases in behind me, putting his legs on either side of my hips, the metal of his mechanical left lower leg cold against my skin before the water warms it. He pulls me back against his chest, resting his hands on my belly. I lay mine on top of his and lay my head back against his shoulder. His lips find my temple and we just hold each other there, not speaking. Slowly, the shaking stops. His breath relaxes. My headache eases. Our hands intertwine over the child I carry. I feel it shift, feel Peeta’s lips turn up at the corners as he feels it, too. “Sing,” he murmurs, and I sigh and begin to hum. Tuneless at first, making it up as I go. But then my father’s song comes back to me, and for the first time a snippet of words surfaces.

_You make me happy when skies are grey…_

Nothing else comes, but that’s all right. Peeta holds tight to me, clinging almost like a child. But I know he will be all right, and that I will be, too.

As long as I can still sing, I will survive.

\-------------------------

**Week 21**

I lean against the cool brick of the bakery, fanning my face with my hand. In the shade it is still humid, and my sundress sticks to my skin, but I am thankful Delly ordered it for me. At least the breeze feels good.

I’m waiting for Peeta to close up for lunch. We’ve planned a bit of a picnic at the lake in the woods, and I’m desperate for a dip in the cool water. The basket sits next to me, packed with fruit and iced tea and a blanket. Peeta was supposed to make cheese buns. My stomach grumbles at the thought.

People pass by and smile at me, and I manage to smile back. The whole district probably knows about my “condition”, but they are all congratulations and smiles. A few have offered to make us dinner; an assortment of mothers have donated old baby things they no longer need. I hate being in debt to anyone, but Delly explained that it’s more out of gratitude for my help in the war, that they’re doing it to pay off what they think is their debt to me. At first I wouldn’t accept any of it – I wanted nothing to do with reparations or gifts owed to me for something I didn’t do. But in the end Peeta and Haymitch convinced me to take some of it. It’s been helpful, anyways. And Beetee sent up a gift after he’d received our call: a one-way radio that we can leave in the baby’s room while it sleeps so that we know when it fusses or wakes up. Even more surprising was Haymitch’s gift. It turned out that all of the boxes he’d gotten off the train were parts for a crib and a changing table. He’d ordered them in a moment of sobriety after we’d told him the news. When he finally told us, I was completely speechless. I think I even cried a bit. In the end all I could do was stare and thank him breathlessly. I had never expected him to do something like that. But he will always be taking care of me, I guess.

I rub my hand over my belly, and hum to myself to pass the time. I feel the baby squirm – it usually does when I start to sing. I’m not one for daydreams, but in the hot summer haze I start to wonder about what they will look like, if it will be a boy or a girl. Will they have Peeta’s hair or my eyes? Will they be able to sing? Or paint?

I scare myself sometimes, musing over a future that is now possible. Never before was there a child to dream about, let alone a husband. If my 17 year old self could see me now, she’d probably just shoot me on site. This was never in the plans. But I wouldn’t change it.

I think Dr. Aurelius would call that a ‘breakthrough’.

I am thinking about names when Peeta walks out the door and locks it behind him. In his hand in a brown paper bag and I can tell by the smell that it is full of my favorite snack. He kisses me and then leans down to kiss my belly. I hear a passerby sigh ‘how sweet’ and I roll my eyes at my husband.

“Stop it,” I mutter, but I can’t keep the laughter out of my voice. He waves me off.

“I can say hi to both of you if I want,” he says, then picks up the picnic basket. “Shall we? I’m starving."

I roll my eyes again, but we set off towards the gate in the fence. He asks about my day, and I tell him about my visit to Delly’s, and about picking out some wool for a blanket to be made by Thom’s wife at their small farm. Peeta is impressed by my spurt of domesticity, and I elbow him in the ribs. He apparently spent all morning making bread (“You don’t say” I tell him), but then he took some times to bake some sweets.

“Lemon cakes. They’ll be perfect for the summer.” He digs into his paper bag and pulls out a wrapped slice of bright yellow cake and hands it to me. It smells sweet and tangy, and when I bite into it, it is soft and delicious.

“How is it? This is the first time I’ve had lemons to work with, I was trying to replicate that one in the Capitol, do you remember --?”

I pop the rest of it into my mouth and nod. “I hope you brought more.”

He grins. “Better than cheese buns?”

“No, but pretty good.” I flash a grin and lift up my skirt so it doesn’t get caught on brambles. I feel Peeta’s fingers brush against my back and I smile to myself. The humidity presses down on us, and I wrap my braid into a bun and pin it with a twig plucked from a bush at the edge of the woods. The heat doesn’t dissipate once we’re under the trees, but we stop at a blackberry bush and pick the fruit and put it into a bowl, popping a few into our mouths and relishing the sweet and sour burst of them. We talk about everything and nothing, about the past and the future, until we reach the clearing. The lake sparkles in the light and looks so inviting I am tempted to run and jump in fully clothed. A glance at Peeta proves he’s thinking the same thing – he’s already moving ahead of me and towards the lake. By the time I reach the edge of the water, he’s pulling off his shirt and unbuttoning his shorts, but he forgot to take off his shoes, so he stumbles around trying to untangle himself. He never was very graceful. I laugh at his antics as I unbutton the front of my dress and slip out of my shoes, but Peeta doesn’t seem to appreciate me making fun of him. When I notice the look he’s giving me, it’s already too late. He scoops me up and tosses me in.

Normally I’d scold him, but when I resurface I can’t bring myself to do it. The water is cool and the mud between my toes feels wonderful. He’s going to hate cleaning it out of his toe joints. I am grateful once again that the Capitol had the ability to not only give him a new leg, but one that was completely waterproof. He never would have made it out of the clock arena without it. I flash a grin at Peeta, who is wading in carefully. He doesn’t want to get stuck.

I inhale and lay back on the water, floating. The sky is so blue, peppered by wispy streaks of clouds. I sigh and close my eyes, listening to the water-muffled sound of my heartbeat and breath. Peeta’s arms are suddenly there to support me, and we drift across the lake in silence.

“This must be what the baby feels like,” I say at some point or another.” Peeta hums in agreement and lays a hand on my belly. I open my eyes and look at the mound rising from the water like an island, with his fingers painting imaginary pictures on the surface. I pretend he’s drawing in the sand, like he did once upon a time under a different colored sky. Except these pictures are happy. It’s a countdown clock, tick-tock, but at midnight there will be joy, not death.

“I was thinking…”

His voice draws me out of my thoughts. He’s still drawing pictures on my stomach, but I can tell he’s looking at something that’s not there, probably an idea in his mind.

“About what?”

He tears his eyes from the picture in his head and looks at me. His eyes are the same color as the sky.

“About a nursery.”

“Oh.” I guess that’s something I should be thinking about, too, but it’s managed to slip my mind. Or I’ve forgotten on purpose.

The only spare room is Prim’s.

He lets me mull it over for a while. We turned my mother’s old room into a studio for Peeta’s painting a long time ago. The canvasses have stacked so high that we’ve had to start storing some of them in the study, which we still use to read and work on our books. That leaves Prim’s room. The one room in the house that has not changed. Peeta tried to coax me into cleaning it out after a few years, but I couldn’t bring myself to do it. It is all I’ve left of my little duck. I keep it clean, dust and vacuum and wash the sheets, but nothing in it changes. It is her mausoleum.

“You need to let her go, Katniss,” Peeta murmurs, his fingers gentle on my skin. I know he feels my body stiffen as I realize what he’s trying to do. He’s anticipating an argument, but he’ll try to reason with me until then. “We can’t exactly put the baby in the pantry.”

I let my feet drop to the bottom of the lake and cross my arms to protect myself from the attack. “I was thinking we could put the crib in our room –“ I say lamely. I don’t meet his eyes. I know what I’ll see in them. Pity. Distress. He wants me past this. For years we struggled with the pain of our losses, but gradually we overcame them. Except Prim. I cannot quite let her go.

“Katniss, you know that won’t be enough,” he says gently. “What about the changing table? The dresser, the toys? And when she’s older, what then?” He reaches out to touch my cheek and I flinch away, and his arm drops. “The baby needs her own room and you know that.”

I don’t respond. I’m clamming up. I’m angry at him for even suggesting what he is and I’m angry at myself for refusing to see the logic. It is Prim’s room, the one piece of her I have left. I know the baby needs a nursery – of course it does. We can’t put everything in our room. There’s not another room in the house. But still, I can’t bear to think of moving my sister’s things.

“What if we built a new room --?” It’s a feeble attempt. I’m grasping at straws.

He shakes his head. “Katniss, it’s time. We need to change that room into a nursery."

I am rushing towards the shoreline before I even know what I’m doing. I don’t want to hear it. I hear him sigh and call after me, but I ignore him. I can feel a black rage boiling up from the chasm in my chest. I put my dress back on as fast as I can, and without bothering to slip on my shoes, I start moving through the grass to the woods. I can hear Peeta trying to come after me, but he’s gotten stuck in the mud, and I am in the trees before he can even get out of the water. I am blinded by my anger – sticks scratch at my legs and face and arms and I trip over roots and stones, but I don’t care. How dare he? When I stumble out of the woods I head straight for the house. Those who see me think twice about calling out a greeting. I am seething with fury, and they can see it, and they avoid me. Good. I know I’m crying, and that probably makes me look even scarier. I don’t care.

Suddenly I’m at the house. I storm in and immediately head upstairs. Prim’s room is the first one in the hall, and I step in and close the door behind me, turning the lock. Peeta won’t break down the door. He wouldn’t.

I look around the room, taking in the dusty silence of it, breath the room and imagine that I can still smell her hair. I sink down to the rug and curl into myself. The baby shifts. _I do not want you_ , I think. _I want my sister back._

And I cry until I can no longer produce tears, and I slip into a haze.

Peeta makes it home eventually. He knocks gently and calls my name, but I do not answer. He doesn’t try the door knob and doesn’t try to force me out. He comes back around dinnertime, tells me I need to eat something, but I don’t move. I don’t want to eat. I don’t want to do anything. The blackness has returned and has me in its grasp. There is no escape now. This time Peeta tries the knob, but when it doesn’t give he sighs in frustration and sets down something in the hall. I do not get up to retrieve it.

I don’t know what time it is when he comes back. Late, judging by the darkness outside the window. His voice is tired when he speaks through the door. He calls to me, pleading that I come out, that I need to eat something, if not for me, then for the baby. I cannot open my mouth to say I do not care anymore. Just as well, because I think he can already tell. I can hear it in his voice.

“Katniss, please don’t do this.”

Somewhere my brain registers that he might be crying.

“You said this wouldn’t happen,” he says, and all I hear are accusations. “You said you’d stay, Katniss. You said that we’d be able to keep you here.” His voice raises and gains an angry edge. “Dammit, Katniss, you can’t stay in there all night!”

He’s wrong.

***

I dream of Prim.

I am in her room, but it is bright and sunny, and the curtains flutter in the breeze. She’s standing at the window with a bundle in her arms, and I know that it is my baby. She is singing in her small sweet voice, a song that I can’t quite recognize. I am happy, seeing her like this. It’s wonderful.

She turns, and I expect a smile, but her face is sad.

“Prim --?”

“She wasn’t supposed to be yours,” she says, and at first I don’t understand. But then I realize that she’s talking about the baby. I frown.

“What are you talking about?”

“You don’t deserve it, Katniss,” she says, and her face begins to distort – shadows of flames lick across her cheeks. The smell of smoke chokes my throat.

“Prim, give me the baby,” I say carefully, watching the smoke begin to rise off of her body, but my sister clutches the bundle closer.

“This isn’t the life you wanted, why should you get to keep it?” she accuses, and the fire blazes at her feet. I smell gunpowder and burning flesh, and I gag.

“What about me, Katniss?” she demands. Her features are charred, and the skin begins to melt off of her body. The baby begins to scream.

“Give her back Prim!”

“You don’t deserve her!” The flames leap higher; her face is an angry mask of blistering skin. 

“Prim, please –“

But the flames swallow them. Neither of them make a sound, but then I realize: the screams are coming from me.

***

I wake up in the darkness of the closet, suffocating on old dresses and the scent of mothballs. In the distance I hear a crash, like glass breaking, and when I realize where I am, I know that it is Peeta. He’s having an attack in the kitchen. I crawl out of the closet, my joints aching. The pain is familiar. I’m dehydrated. For a moment the fear of that pain makes me freeze, but it passes. I no longer care if I die.

I don’t know how long I’ve been gone, how long I was in the closet. It’s morning, judging by the light outside. It could have been one night, or several days. My stomach is an empty pit, but I am past hunger. I want nothing more than to let the chasm swallow me. I am absently aware of the punches and kicks the baby is delivering, but I can’t bring myself to care. The only thing I feel is the sand on my tongue, and I decide that a small drink of water won’t prolong my death too much, so I drift to the door, unlocking it and finding a plate of food – complete with cheese bun – and a glass of water. I pick this up and begin to drink. I walk down the hall on silent feet to use the restroom, not really registering anything beyond my own movement. I glance at myself in the mirror, finding a pale face and bloodshot eyes. A thin body swollen with a parasite. I glare down at the thing draining me, and I hear more crashes from downstairs. _There go the dishes_ , I think blankly. I feel no emotion, except resentment towards the baby. Protected, safe. Completely unaware of the hell that surrounds it. Innocent and ignorant. It has no idea how awful of a mother it has. How selfish, how unfeeling.

_You should have been Prim’s._

She never had the chance. This should have been her life. Her voice from the dream taunts me, _You don’t deserve this!_

I drift back to Prim’s room, fresh tears running down my cheeks. I’m surprised I can still cry. The crashes from the kitchen have stopped, and I can hear Peeta sobbing and ranting all at once.

_I’m sorry,_ I think to the baby. _You don’t deserve crazy parents._ It doesn’t deserve a father that might kill it in a hijacked rage, or a mother that will starve herself to death…

My head snaps up at Peeta’s shout. He’s yelling my name, and I hear him hit the stairs. Running. He’s heard me. Panicking, I slam the door behind me and lock it just in time.

Peeta’s fists hit the wood so hard I’m surprised the door didn’t come off its hinges. I think he might break it down.

“Katniss! Get out here! Quit fucking hiding and come out!” His voice is raw. “Goddammit, what’s wrong with you?”

What isn’t wrong with me? I sink down against the opposite wall. I can’t open it. He’ll kill me if I do.

_No he won’t, ___a voice pipes up. _He’s worried about you, let him in…_

I clamp my hands over my ears to drown it out. He won’t understand. He doesn’t understand what it’s like.

The pounding on the door weakens, and Peeta subsides into sobs.

“Katniss, please… why won’t you come out? I can help you, Dr. Bryke… I love you, remember? Please come out…”

I wish I could react. Part of me desperately wants to, but I can’t. The world starts to spin, and I can hear Peeta begin to bang on the door again, his rage returned.

I pass out before the door crashes to the floor.

***

When I wake, I am somewhere else. I feel weak, so very weak, and I struggle to open my eyes. The first thing I see is sunlight and a landscape that flies by. I am on a train. I close my eyes again. It has to be a dream. But then I hear voices, and they’re not the ones in my head.

I open my eyes again and move my head enough to glance around the cabin. I am lying on a couch. There is an adhesive bandage on the inside of my elbow. Peeta sits across from me, nodding off. There are bags under his eyes, and the wrinkles on his forehead have deepened. Guilt chokes me. That’s a good sign. It means the chasm is closing.

“Peeta?”

His head snaps up and he looks at me with bloodshot eyes. Usually he smiles when he wakes up and sees me, but now he looks too exhausted and burnt out to bother.

“You’re awake,” he says, straightening in his seat. I nod and shift, my hand drifting to my belly. The baby shoves back faintly, and I breathe a small sigh of relief.

“What happened? Where are we going?”

Peeta rubs his face and sighs. “You were gone for three days, Katniss.”

More guilt. I think I might throw up.

“You wouldn’t come out,” he continues. He won’t meet my eyes, and that scares me. “You wouldn’t eat, you screamed bloody murder in your sleep, and I had to listen to every minute of it.”

My stomach roils, and I have to close my eyes to keep the room from spinning.

“You can’t keep doing this Katniss.” I expect him to sound angry, but he just sounds weary.

I open my mouth, but nothing comes. He shakes his head.

“I swore the day we were married that this was for better or for worse and so did you.” His voice finally starts to rise. “We’re partners, dammit. We’re a team, we’re supposed to be in this together. But I can’t help you when you lock me out!”

I curl up and take it, trying not to puke.

“And now –“ He puts his head in his hands and tugs on his hair, trying not to yell. “You’re pregnant. With our child. Ours. And you locked yourself in a dead girl’s room and starved yourself because you’re too fucking selfish to realize that you’re responsible for another human being!”

I stare at him in shock. My own anger starts to bubble in my empty stomach, and he takes a deep breath. 

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it like that, I know… I know you took care of them –“ He clenches his jaw and takes a few more heavy breaths before continuing. “But that baby is completely dependent on you. If you starve yourself, you starve the baby. Is that what you want?”

I don’t have the heart to tell him that for a while, trapped in that hell, that is what I wanted.

“Do you realize what could have happened?”

I do know, and the self-loathing creeps up the back of my throat like bile. I cannot argue with him. I can’t even be mad. Everything he is saying is true. I stare at my hands, unable to speak, waiting for Peeta to continue, but he just stares at me.

“I’m sorry,” I whisper, and his body relaxes. He slides to the floor and kneels before me, taking my hands in his.

“We’re a family now,” he says quietly. “It can’t be just you anymore. It has to be the both of us, especially now.” He kisses my forehead. “I love you, don’t ever make me break down a door again, okay?”

I sniff and nod, and he keeps his head pressed to mine. I notice that his knuckles are swollen and bruised, and I kiss them.

“I’m sorry,” I repeat, and he just shakes his head.

“I’m not going to say that it’s fine,” he tells me, “because it isn’t.” He sighs and sits back in his seat. “But we’ll make it."

He will not sit with me. He’s not forgiven me yet. I accept this. I don’t deserve to be forgiven.

We are silent for a while, until I remember that he hasn’t answered my other question.

“Where are we going?”

He doesn’t take his eyes off the window. “District 4. I called your mother.”


	6. Week 22

**Week 22 (July – District 4)**

We arrive in District 4 as the sun is setting. Annie meets us at the station, Finn at her side. I nearly break again when I see him, the spitting image of his father, albeit thin and gangly. I don’t know how Annie does it, raising a son that must remind her so much of Finnick. But the boy – now 15 – is much more like his mother in temperament. Shy and sweet. I guess that’s what she must have been like before she lost her mind in the Games.

But the Annie Cresta-Odair that greets us seems calm and balanced. She smiles, and hugs and kisses our cheeks. She touches my belly and congratulates us without any hint of admonishment for not having told her. We’ll be staying at her house, she says, and that my mother is looking forward to seeing us, but she’d been with a patient and hoped that we wouldn’t mind seeing her later.

We take a car and then a boat to the Victors Village, which is located on a small island off shore. The air smells briny and harsh, and the breeze is cool off the ocean. The shapes of boats dot the horizon and I can hear Peeta breathe a sigh. Maybe he’ll paint while we’re here. Maybe it will help him get his mind off of his crazy wife.

Dinner is a salad and grilled fish. I want to eat it, to make Peeta happy and so that I won’t insult Annie, but it tastes like paper in my mouth. Finn takes up trying to explain sailing to Peeta, and Annie shows me photos of her son, while we wait for my mother to arrive. It isn’t until late that she comes in, wearing her white Healers coat. I never understood why they insist on wearing white. It always makes the blood look so much worse. She looks everywhere but at me until it can no longer be helped, and when our eyes meet I can hear the room hold its breath.

She looks old, older than I’ve ever seen her. Her corn silk hair is practically white, and there is a gauntness to her that scares me. She seems translucent. Only her eyes are the same. Prim’s eyes. I choke.

“Mom?”

Something in her face shifts, and we meet in the middle, her arms going around me so weak at first but growing into a vice I cannot – and strangely do not – want to escape. Tears spill over my eyes, and I can feel wetness on her cheeks too. The room gives a collective sigh, and we pull away. She brushes my hair back and holds my face in her hands, trying to smile, trying to speak. I just shake my head. Later.

Instead, we go to bed. It has been a long trip, and Peeta and I are exhausted. Annie shows us to the spare room and we crawl into the strange bed without saying much of anything. But he puts his arm tightly around me, like he’s afraid I’ll try to escape. It’s unlikely. There’s nowhere to run.

***

Peeta doesn’t let me sleep in the next morning. He says he’s tired of me sleeping. I personally think he just wants to torture me, but in my guilt I groan and crawl out of bed. He’s right, anyway; I’ve slept enough.   
He helps me get dressed, taking a moment to lean down and kiss my belly and whisper to the baby, who turns toward his voice. I feel the sudden urge to apologize again, but I’m terrified that no matter how much I say it, it won’t be enough. But when he straightens he kisses me, too, and there is no strain. He’s upset with me, yes, but that doesn’t stop him from loving me. Still, it’s going to take more than just sleeping it off to make it better.

We walk to breakfast in silence. Finn and Annie have set the table with fruit and some sort of grain – I recognize the green color from the bread sent to us in the second Arena. When we take our seats, Finn asks Peeta if he’d like to go out on the boat with him after breakfast. Peeta says he’ll be fairly useless, but that he’d like to see the ocean, and could he maybe take a sketchbook along? Annie is humming to herself, and I wonder what she’s thinking. Finn tries to explain the basics of sailing again to Peeta while we eat, and I eventually grow bored with the technical talk and turn to Annie.

“What are we doing today?” I ask her. She turns her dark green eyes to me, like she’s surprised that I’m there, and I smile tentatively. 

“What did you say, Katniss?” Her voice is soft and distant, like she’s speaking from somewhere else. I smile again and repeat my question. She thinks for a moment too long, and I feel stupid for asking.

“Not that I was expecting you to have plans, I was just wondering…”

“We’ll go down to the beach,” she says, and I nod. Peeta and I didn’t get to enjoy the beach the last time we were here; we were ushered through too quickly after the disaster in District 11.

“That sounds nice.” I turn back to the cold grain and milk in front of me. It’s different, but it’s not bad. Peeta has already devoured his. Annie suddenly starts talking about having to repair some nets for Finnick’s boat, but it takes us all a moment to realize that she’s not talking about her son. I glance down the table at Finn, whose green eyes have hardened over. How often has he had to take care of a deranged mother who thinks his dead father is still alive? I want him to look at me, so that I can try to tell him I will watch after her today, but he won’t meet anyone’s eyes. I feel Peeta’s hand find my leg beneath the table and he gives my thigh a brief squeeze before standing and clapping the boy on the shoulder. 

“Let’s see this boat of yours,” he says, and Finn nods and they leave through the back door. I try and finish my breakfast. Annie has returned to humming, and eventually she stands and walks out the door. I sigh and follow her. 

The sun is hot here. The sky is incredibly blue and smattered with clouds that seem to sink right into the ocean. The air tastes like salt, and a warm breeze blows my hair back from my face and whips my skirt around my legs. My eyes search for Annie, and I spot her dark head by the shore. I pick my way slowly across the sand, enjoying the feel of the fine, white grains between my toes. The roar of the surf mutes my calls to her. Even if the world had been silent, though, I don’t think she would have heard me. She’s in her own reality.

To be honest, the sea scares me. I can swim, but the power behind the water here is terrifying. I spot Finn and Peeta on the dock, and I hope that Peeta doesn’t fall overboard.

“Annie?” I have finally stepped up to her. Her hair, streaked with grey, whips around her head; her eyes gaze into the distance. When she doesn’t respond, I stare at the horizon with her. The sky is the same blue as the water, making it hard to tell where they meet, but it’s a view worth seeing. The sheer openness of it makes me feel vulnerable – I long for the closeness and security of the trees – but as the waves lap at my bare feet, their steady rhythm calms me down. I let my brain sink inward, and I touch my belly.

“He’s not really gone, you know.”

It takes me a moment to register that Annie has spoken, and when I finally turn my head she is still staring at the distance. But her eyes are lucid. She’s here, not somewhere else. I inhale the salty air and sigh. 

“Annie… he’s dead. How is he not gone?”

And then she looks at me with so much sadness in her eyes that at first I don’t realize that it’s for me.

“He said he’d never leave,” she says, and I wonder if she’s slipping back into her dream world, but she goes on, her eyes fixed on mine. “The people who love us never really go away, Katniss. Our love for them keeps them with us.”

That’s when I know she’s no longer talking about Finnick.

“She’s--” I choke and start again. “Prim is gone. There’s no bringing her back.”

She laughs – that awkward, out of place giggle that makes her seem so mad. I feel rage flare up inside of me. Is she laughing at me?

“Oh, Katniss,” she giggles. “She never left!” And then she looks back at the ocean, her laughter suddenly gone. I’m completely confused.

“They don’t leave us,” she says in a soft voice. “If they love us they never really leave.”

I’ve had enough. I never could understand her like Finnick could. “Annie, what are you talking about?”

She turns and places a hand on my belly, her eyes boring into mine. She smiles.

“She’s right here,” she says, and then she turns and wades into the waves fully clothed. I am too stunned to follow.

***

My mother is gone the whole day. So is Peeta. After this morning, Annie has been making nets and mumbling to someone who is not there. Utterly alone, I take to a hammock strung up between two shade palms and try to nap the day away. It is beautiful here, there’s no doubt, but I can’t rest soundly because what Annie said keeps playing over and over in my head. Eventually I give up on a nap and walk down to the shore, letting the water lap at my swollen ankles until I grow tired of standing and sit down in the surf. But I’ve forgotten about the tide, and I end up chasing the waterline as the moon pulls it back out to sea. I’m scooting into the water again when Peeta finds me. 

“Having some trouble?” he asks, his face split into a grin. I squint at him. 

“My ankles are swollen and my back hurts.” I hate excuses, but at least these are legitimate ones for looking like an idiot. He just keeps grinning at me. 

“It’s dinnertime. Come on.” He reaches out to pull me up, but my added weight and the shifting sand work against him, and he topples into the surf next to me. I throw my head back and laugh. I hear him laugh, too, and I grab him by the ears and kiss him. He responds warmly, and the fear that he’d still be mad at me begins to dissipate.

“We need to go change,” he says after he pulls away. I nod, and we manage to get to our feet after a few tries. Sopping wet, we head back to the house hand in hand.

Dinner is fish that was caught earlier today, fresh and flaky and grilled with lemon. My mother sits across from me, silent. I wish she would say something. I don’t know how to start a conversation. Peeta comes to my rescue, recounting his day on the boat with Finn. When he finishes, my mother manages to ask him how the bakery is doing. He doesn’t miss a beat. He describes this season’s new experiments, the wedding cake he made for a young couple from 13, the recipe for his grandfather’s red pepper jelly that he’s been trying to recreate for years. She smiles and nods, comments on his efforts, but she can barely look at me. I feel resentment stick in the back of my throat. After dinner, though, she manages to approach me.

“How are you feeling?” she asks quietly. I stare at her for a moment, startled.

“Fine,” I say. “Tired.”

She nods, and there’s an awkward silence. I think she’s afraid to move towards me. Peeta nudges me, and I ask her if she wants to feel the baby kick. The tension leaves her body, and she moves to sit next to me on the sofa. 

“How far along are you?” he asks, and her voice has switched to its healer tone; I have become another patient. I’m strangely okay with this. The awkwardness is gone when she’s being clinical.

“Almost 22 weeks.”

Her hands come up and feel my belly, poking and prodding like Dr. Bryke does. I lied about the awkwardness being gone. This is her grandchild. Not a stranger.

“Mom--”

She looks up at me and her eyes refocus, like she’s realizing it’s me. Peeta holds my hands for support.

“Congratulations,” she says in a choked voice, her hands leaving my stomach. “I meant to tell you yesterday – congratulations.”

I know what she’s thinking. That she thought this would have been Prim. That joy should have brought us together, not the blackness of my depression. That she never expected me to have children, at least not with the son of the baker. I can forgive her for that one. Neither did I. 

“I think it’s a girl,” Peeta pipes up, trying to make us talk. My mother nods.

“That would be nice,” she says, and I can hear the catch in her throat. She’s thinking of Prim again. So am I. 

“Katniss, I want to talk to you… about some things,” she says. “Not tonight. Tomorrow. Come to the clinic.”

I nod. I know what she wants to talk about. It’s the reason Peeta brought me here. She seems better – maybe she can really help.

“Okay,” I say. She gives me a wavering smile and pats my hand, then announces that she needs to head home. Peeta leaps up and offers to walk her, and she accepts. I stand and hug her before they leave, and once they’re out the door I tell Annie and Finn that I’ll head to bed. It’s been a long day.

When Peeta gets back I am curled up under the sheets, enjoying the breeze that ruffles the curtains. The distant crash of the waves lulls me to sleep, but when I feel him crawl into bed with me I wake up long enough to see his smile. He kisses me, and it lingers. It takes a little longer for me to fall asleep the second time.

***

The clinic has that antiseptic smell that I hate so much, but at least it’s not all bright white. My mother works as a nurse here. She wouldn’t accept a higher position. She told me to meet her at the main station for lunch. I’m wishing Peeta had come with me, but he told me that this wasn’t for him. It was my fight, something only my mother could understand and help me with. He’s right, of course, but that doesn’t mean I have to like it. 

The nurses in the halls point me in the right direction, and I find my mother standing with a group of women behind a large, circular desk. She’s smiling, laughing. I haven’t seen her laugh like that in a long time. When she turns her head and sees me, the smile falters slightly, but I twitch my lips up in response. She says something to the other women and walks towards me. 

“Are you hungry?” she asks, and I nod. I’m ravenous. She smiles and leads me to a room down the hall. I recognize it as an exam room, and the ultrasound machine sends me into a flash of déjà vu. 

“I have some shrimp and rice,” she says, and I accept the cloth covered bowl she hands me. It’s delicious. 

“Annie made it,” she says quietly. “She likes to make my lunches. Such a sweet girl.” Girl. Like she’s still the young, tortured woman my mother met years ago.

“She is,” I reply, stuffing my mouth. Rice has become my new craving. We don’t speak again until we have finished eating. My mother clears her throat.

“Peeta called me before you came,” she starts. “He was very worried about you.”

I look at my hands. This had better not end in a guilt trip. 

“Dr. Bryke told him to contact me, did you know?”

I shake my head. No, I hadn’t, but I’m not really surprised. 

Her voice softens. “Katniss, I know I… I know I haven’t been the best of mothers, but we need to talk about your depression. Let me help you.”

I sigh. I knew this was coming, what with how clinical she’s being. But I also know that she’s better. And if my mother, the stone statue of my childhood, can overcome the blackness in her head, so can I. I nod.

“I didn’t mean to get so bad,” I say, and then I start to choke. “I didn’t mean to put the baby in danger.” The tears rush in all at once. “I just couldn’t – I couldn’t clear out her room, I couldn’t do it--”

She puts her arms around me and I cry into her shoulder, much like I did the day of my wedding. It’s funny how we only come together in these bittersweet moments, when we need the support of each other. How she’s only really my mother when she’s the only help I have, when she’s the only one that understands. She murmurs endearments, and I feel the wetness of her tears on the top of my head. We mourn, and then we pull away.

“You have to let it go, Katniss,” she tells me, brushing my tears away. “Your father… in the dead of winter, when we were starving to feed you and your sister… he would say, ‘remember the spring’. That’s what you have to do. Focus on new life, not on death.”

It’s surreal to hear this from her, but she’s right. I wonder what she’s on that makes her better, and can I start taking it? I’m sick of the blackness. I want the pills.

“How did you do it?” I ask her. “How did you get past it finally?”

“We made the medicine,” she says. “We perfected an old remedy to give to people who suffered worse than others after the war.” She brushes my hair back from my face. “I want you to try it.”

I nod, willing to do anything at this point, but she frowns a bit.

“We’ve never tested it on a pregnant woman. So you’ll have to wait. We don’t know how it will affect the baby.”

My heart sinks a little, but I understand. I want nothing to do with something that might hurt my baby.

“I understand. But what do I do until then?”

She sighs. “You focus on the good things. On the bright things. Your husband, your child. And when you have the baby, we’ll start you on the medicine.”

I nod, my hands already on my belly. My mother places one of hers on the mound as well, and she smiles. I put my hand over hers, and we sit in silence until it is time to go. 

***

The sound of footsteps in the hall wakes me. My eyes snap open and I listen intently. Someone is walking down the stairs. Curiosity getting the better of me, I swing my legs out of bed and stand up, being careful not to wake Peeta, who had had his arm slung over my waist. I creep to the door and peek through the crack. All I catch is a dark figure in a white nightgown disappearing down the steps. I frown, but she’s probably just getting something to drink. I’m about to crawl back into bed when I hear the screen door hit the frame. I move to the window and look outside – sure enough, Annie is moving toward the surf. Panic sears through me and I dart from the room as fast as I can. When I make it outside, she has her feet in the water, facing the horizon where the full moon hangs from the sky. Her dark hair waves around her face and the water laps at her feet, and her body sways back and forth in time with the waves. I go to her, afraid of scaring her, but she knows I’m there, because she turns and smiles and holds out her hands to me. I take them and she pulls me into the surf. I gasp at the chill, but I’m no longer worried. Annie has that look in her eyes. She’s here.

“We’re all called by it, you know,” she says. “Men don’t know the pull, but we do. We feel it push and pull our bodies like it pulls the tides.”

I open my mouth to ask, but her eyes turn to the moon and I know. Of course.

“You don’t feel it so much when you carry them,” she continues, laying her hands on my belly like a blessing. “They pull against it because they’re too young. But you know the call. You came.”

“Annie, I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Again.

She smiles and caresses my belly. “She’ll be strong,” she whispers, and the she looks up at me, taking my hands again. “Now listen and be calm.”

I frown but do as she says. And after a while, after listening to the waves and the wind, I am surprised to find that I am calm.

_Funny thing about the sea. Its chaos is the most soothing thing in the world._

I could’ve heard his voice on the wind, but I know it’s in my head. In my heart, just like he’s in Annie’s.

Just like Prim.


	7. Weeks 24 & 25

**Week 24**

"Would you hold still? I can't draw when you keep moving."

I fidget and settle onto the blanket again. Why on earth I agreed to sit for a sketch is beyond me, but Peeta insisted, so I decided to humor him. I am reclining in the sun on the beach, wearing another sundress, this time a blue one lent to me by Annie. My belly balloons in front of me, not quite a beach ball, but I'm six months in and I feel like I could be rolled into the water. Peeta sits a few feet away, his sketchpad propped up on his knees. His arm moves in short, quick strokes as he draws, and his eyes flick up every now and then to look at me. When I complained about him wanting to draw me of all things, he told me that he wanted to remember how beautiful I looked. I told him to paint a picture of a cow.

"It'll look the same," I'd told him, but he'd just told me to be quiet and let him sketch.

"We should buy a video camera," I tell him now, trying not to move too much. He grunts in response, chewing on the inside of his cheek in concentration.

"Not like the insect shells," I continue. "A little one. We can take videos of the baby and watch them later when it's older and hates us."

"She won't hate us," he says, furiously erasing something. "Now stop talking."

I turn up my nose and fall silent. We've been in District 4 for two weeks now. Peeta calls it a vacation. I'll admit, it's nice to be away, but I miss the closeness of the broadleaf trees at home. I miss the mountains and the foggy sunrises. But I'd be okay with having a summer home here. I tell Peeta this, and he throws down his pencil.

"Dammit, woman!" he exclaims, but then he's laughing and I grin at him. Mission accomplished.

"It'd be nice," he says, moving to lay on the blanket with me. His fair face has been burnt red by the sun, as have his chest and arms. I'm guilty, I've been enjoying that he has taken to not wearing a shirt. He might not have the taut muscle definition he had when we were younger, but he is still fit and broad-shouldered, and I love getting to see him like this. He doesn't appreciate it as much as I do; after the first really bad burn I had to have Annie and my mother help me coat him in a green goo that reminded me of the suspension I had floated in after the bombs exploded in the Capitol and burned half of my back away. But it eased his pain, and that was all that mattered. He was no longer bright red, more of a rusty brick color – I took that as his tan.

"What if we got one now?" he says, bringing me out of my reverie. Oh. The video camera.

"We could."

He eyes me carefully. "You never want to spend money. Are you feeling okay?"

I shrug. "Frivolous, I guess."

He laughs and kisses my bare shoulder. I sigh and wouldn't mind if he continued, but a shadow appears over us and I crack my eyes open. It's Annie.

"I want to throw a party," she says, smiling widely. "For you and the baby."

I sit up and stare at her, and Peeta does the same. "That sounds great!" he says. "We could invite everyone. Beetee, Johanna, Effie-"

"I don't know," I tell Annie. She keeps smiling.

"Your mother suggested it."

Of course she did.

"Come on, Katniss," Peeta practically whines. I glance over and he's bouncing like a child. "We haven't seen them in years!"

I frown at him and he laughs. "They said themselves that they'd love to see you."

"What if they can't make it?" I ask. "They can't just up and leave their Districts, it's a lot of money."

"And we're Victors who all happen to be rich," Peeta deadpans.

"Everything's taken care of," Annie says wistfully. I frown. Great.

"Who all did you invite?" I ask. Annie smiles at me and starts listing off names. Johanna, Beetee, Effie and Haymitch, Gale –

"You invited Gale?" I can feel all of the blood drain from my face. I'm almost dizzy. I haven't even told Gale about the pregnancy –

"Of course!" And then she sees my face and her happy expression fails. "Was that wrong?"

I rush to assure her that it's fine, but now she's nervous that she's messed up. Peeta does a better job at calming her down, and with a curious look thrown over his shoulder he leads Annie back into the house. I sigh and fall back onto the blanket and cover my face with my hands.

Gale is going to be here. We haven't spoken in years. Since after I assassinated President Coin, actually. I've seen him on the television, of course. Seen his gorgeous blond wife, his three kids. Will they come, too? I hope they do. It will help solidify the fact that it is no longer us against the world. Unfortunately, part of me wants to hate his new life. Not because I feel like he belongs to me, but because he's managed to find happiness after all of the devastation. Because maybe he's responsible for killing my sister.

My throat closes up. I could find out, once and for all. He has to know the truth by now.

But it's been fifteen years. Is that what's holding me back with accepting Prim's death? Not knowing who's at fault? If that's the case, then I'm more selfish than I originally thought.

"Are you coming in?"

I move my hands and see Finn standing over me. He looks so much like his father – I see Finnick every time I look at him – but there's something soft about him, something of his mother that rounds out the edges. It might be the eyes. Like Annie's. Dark. Sad. Not the smirking sea green that was always full of laughter. Shy, not the confident and self-assured man I knew. What has it been like for him? To grow up with two famous parents, and one of them not even alive to reassure him? I know what it's like to be without a father and to have a distant, sometimes mad mother. I want to tell him that it will be okay. That his parents helped make a world that is better. That his father was a hero. But he has already heard these things, so I reach my hand out. He hesitates and then grasps my hand and pulls me up. I thank him and tuck my arm in his. He blushes, and I smile at him. Another thing he has of his father's is my trust.

"What?"

He swallows and mumbles, "You're the Mockingjay."

I roll my eyes. "Not to you, I'm not. I'm a friend of your parents, that's all."

He nods, looking a little more relaxed, but I don't think he's convinced. Still, he's no longer blushing.

"What… what was he like?"

I freeze and look up at him, feeling my heart clench. All he's ever heard about his father has been either from Annie, who sometimes thinks that he's still alive, or from the media, who praises him as more of a hero than a sex icon these days, but that's still there in the background. He's never heard it from anyone else. I swallow.

"He was…" I have to think. So many words could be used to describe Finnick Odair. Brave. Funny. Intelligent. Handsome. Devoted. Selfless. But as I look up at his son, fifteen and gangly and desperate to live up to a dead man's legacy, I settle on something better: the honest truth.

"He was a good man."

* * *

 

**Week 25**

The day of the party dawned overcast. I took it as a sign that it was going to be awful. Peeta, forever seeing the bright side, says a little rain never hurt a party, until I remind him of Johanna's intense fear of storms – a fear that I think we all share to some degree after the Quarter Quell. That sobers him slightly, possibly because we'll all be together again. On a beach. His expression says it all: maybe this wasn't such a good idea.

"Wish you could tell me that wasn't real," he says, and I lay my cheek on his shoulder.

"Me too."

Beetee arrives first, rolling his wheelchair up the walk with a smile glued to his wrinkled and ashen face. Tears well up in his eyes behind the lenses of his crooked glasses as he stretches out his arms to embrace me the best he can, and I kiss his cheek. I am genuinely happy to see this man.

Annie is in top form, ushering Beetee inside and setting him up with iced tea. We all sit in the living room until the others arrive, catching up. He's been busy at inventing, coming up with simplified Capitol conveniences to introduce into the less 'advanced' districts. He catches himself, apologizing rapidly, but Peeta just laughs. We knew what he meant.

Johanna arrives an hour or so later, glaring fiercely at the grey sky until she sees me and Peeta, and then her face cracks into a smile. Her eyes are yellow around the edges, and I wonder if she's been into morphling again, but I don't want to ask. She wouldn't tell me anyway. She kisses Beetee and Annie, watches Finn from across the room like he's ghost. She sneaks off now and then to use the restroom. At one point Peeta sends me a grim sideways glance. Not all of us can deal with our demons.

Annie surprises us by having invited Delly and Rolan and their children, including the brand new baby boy Cole. My mother shows up with them, delighted by the children and especially the baby. I apologize for not being there for the delivery, but she just waves me off, saying "It happened so fast Dr. Bryke didn't show up until after he was born!" I smile to hide my uneasiness. I would have probably fainted. The children run outside to marvel at the sand and sea; Finn follows to watch them. I feel sorry for the boy. Too young to reminisce with the adults, but too old to play with the kids. Though I think Johanna feels better when he leaves.

Effie and Haymitch show up together, making Peeta and I quirk eyebrows at our mentor. He just glares while Effie goes on about how big, big, big I look. She's brought gifts that I can't bear to open now, and she just waves me off and chatters on about my simple sundress and how the loveliest designer in the Capitol has a line of maternity clothes and wouldn't I just look wonderful in them! I smile and nod, and behind her Haymitch rolls his eyes and moves to go shake hands with Beetee.

Peeta fidgets next to me, and before I can ask him what's wrong, he goes up to Delly and asks her if he can hold baby Cole. She smiles and hands him over, showing Peeta how to support his head. My husband, so large and strong, suddenly becomes small and meek, like he's afraid he'll drop him. I watch him carefully. Will he hold our baby like this? Will he laugh and grin and unconsciously rock them to stillness? Cole looks tiny in his arms, and Peeta grows more confident, coming over to me. He is all smiles and bright eyes.

"Katniss, look."

Cole is a small pink thing wrapped in a blanket, with grey-blue eyes that cannot focus on my face. His features are squashy and his lips seem to be permanently puckered. To be honest, he's not a very attractive baby – plain, like his parents. But he gurgles and my heart flutters and Peeta places him in my arms.

He's so small but so solid. We stare at each other for a bit, and then he squirms and starts to screw up his face. I'm suddenly aware of everyone watching me, and I begin to panic.

"Delly, I think he might be hungry," I say above the slow wail that Cole has taken up. He's caterwauling before Delly reaches me. I practically dump him into his mother's arms.

Haymitch sidles up beside me and mumbles, "Nice going, sweetheart." I resist the urge to kick him. Peeta just laughs and kisses me, whispering so only I can hear, "Our baby will be much cuter." I laugh at that, but then there's a knock on the door, and I freeze. Annie answers, and Gale Hawthorne and his family walk in.

There's a moment of tension between Gale and I. He hugs Annie and smiles, but his eyes search for me. When our gazes meet, my heart quickens, but not from excitement. It's from sadness. The Gale I knew isn't there. Instead, a broken and jaded man looks back at me with those grey Seam eyes that that are so like mine. But his lips quirk in their old way when he steps away from Annie and he says to me, "Hey, Catnip."

I can't help it – I start to cry. Before I can stop myself I have thrown myself at him, and God love him he catches me in his arms and a weight is lifted from my chest. If he wonders at my sudden impulsive behavior he doesn't ask. I want to laugh at how absurd it all is. For years we've avoided each other, keeping our distance so that we wouldn't cause each other anymore pain. But as I cry into his chest, I am aware of how much I have missed this man. And I realize as we embrace and cry – I forgive him. If he was responsible or not for my sister's death, it no longer matters. I forgive him. 'Focus on life, not on death,' my mother said. Well, I'm taking her advice.

Someone clears their throat, and we pull apart. A tall blond woman puts her hand on Gale's shoulder and says, "Maybe you should introduce us?"

Gale blushes and puts his arm around her. "Katniss, this is my wife, Rozz."

I reach out my hand and she takes it. We shake carefully, sizing each other up. I decide I like her.

"It's nice to meet you," I say. She smiles with dazzling white teeth.

"I've heard so much about you," she says. "It's wonder to finally meet the Mockingjay."

I force a smile and Gale coughs and pushes three little boys forward. They look just like him – Seam.

"This is Tank, Mason, and Zane," he says, and the little boys mumble 'hello' before tugging on their father's sleeve and asking if they can go outside and see the water. He shoves them out the door, and Peeta steps up and shakes hands with Gale. My heart skips a beat. This is something I have always dreaded. The look he and Gale wear when they shake hands is the same one Rozz and I wore moments earlier. They're sizing each other up; Peeta is asserting his dominance. I can read every word on his face: She's mine. Some kind of unspoken conversation occurs between them, and then they are slapping each other on the back like old friends. I release the breath I had been holding. It's strange what the years can do.

My mother comes up and embraces Gale, asking him about his mother and brothers and sister. Gale smiles and tells her about them, and I offer Rozz a seat and a drink, which she gladly accepts. I hand her a glass of iced tea and sit beside her on the sofa, sighing as I sink into the cushions.

"How far along are you?" she asks. She's very pretty, with brown eyes and honey blond hair, and I can see why Gale married her. She exudes calm and security, something I severely lack. How odd, I think, to be sitting here now, when only days ago I dreaded this moment.

"Six months," I tell her. She nods, the understanding of a fellow mother passing between us. It's a binding factor that I'm starting to appreciate. I suddenly have things in common with people I never would have spoken to before. I laugh to myself. Motherhood is turning me into a people person. Haymitch would throw a fit if he knew. I look over at him now, standing next to Effie and sipping from a flask as she sits and chats with Delly. Johanna and Beetee sit in the corner, talking quietly with Annie, who has pulled out a photo album. A scream of delight is occasionally heard from outside, and I can see through the back door that Finn is chasing the kids across the sand. I sigh, and Peeta looks over at me and smiles. I smile back and take up conversation with my new friend about nurseries.

Later, Gale comes up to me after we finish eating. The sky has cleared, and we have moved outside to view the sunset. Peeta is down on the beach painting, trying to capture his favorite color on canvas. I am reclining in a chair when he approaches, looking uncomfortable and anxious. I open my eyes and frown at him.

"What is it?"

He fidgets – so unlike Gale – and then takes a seat next to me. I notice that Rozz is out playing with their children in the sand. He sighs and wrings his hands.

"I still don't know whose it was, Katniss," he whispers urgently. "I've tried and tried to find out if I was the one that did it, but I can't-"

He looks at me with haunted eyes. "I can't sleep, sometimes. I see her face, but she's on fire and she's saying something but I can't hear it."

I have to shut my eyes to block out the images so similar to my own nightmares. "It doesn't matter, Gale," I say after a while, and I believe every word I say. "Our side or theirs – you didn't kill her. The war did."

He stares at me with questions and wonder in his eyes. I laugh, a short bark of bitter amusement.

"I know. I didn't think I'd ever say it either."

He eyes me carefully. "You've changed," he says. I really laugh at that.

"You can blame him for that," I say, nodding in Peeta's direction. Gale's lips quirk up.

"You're happy with him?" he asks, not looking at me. I nod.

"Very. He's…" Will Gale ever understand about the boy with the bread? About the dandelion in the spring? But then I look at his wife and children and I know that he, too, has found the balm for the burning inside of him. I smile. "He's what I need to survive."

The look on his face tell me he remembers that conversation all those years ago, but he doesn't resent me for bringing it up. His gaze finds Rozz and his boys, and he smiles.

"I know the feeling," he says. "I realized that when I met her. That I didn't need all the anger and hate we both had. The fear. I needed something else. Calm. She… she's all of that. And when I realized that, I finally understood why you chose Peeta. Because you needed him more."

"I love him," I say quietly, watching the man at the easel down the beach. It is strangely easy, talking to Gale like this about the people we love most. A piece that was missing inside of me comes back. I realize I missed Gale more than I thought.

"It's scary, loving someone that much. I thought…" He swallows, preparing to say something delicate. "I thought I loved you like that, until I met Rozz."

I think he's afraid that he might've upset me, but I just nod, happy he's found someone to be his dandelion, his new life in the spring. "I know," I say. "It still scares me how much I love him."

"Enough for you to change your mind about having kids? That is scary." And then the old Gale is suddenly back, laughing and joking with me and making me smile. We talk about our married lives, their children. How District 12 is doing. What it's like to live in District 2. We catch up on fifteen years of life sitting there on the beach, watching our loved ones until talk turns toward the future.

"Were you happy when you had them?" I ask him. He laughs.

"I was terrified. Rozz was the calm one. I can gut deer and shoot enemy soldiers, but I pass out when my wife delivers my sons."

I laugh wildly. "All of them?" He looks at the sand beneath his feet sheepishly, and I throw my head back. People stare at me like I might have finally lost it. Peeta turns his blond head in question, and I grin at him. He smiles back, completely confused, but I think he's happy to hear me laugh so freely. I feel the best I have in a month. Surrounded by my family and friends, I know everything is going to be all right.


	8. Weeks 27 & 28

**Week 27 – August, District 12**

I started with a dress.

And not just any dress. It was the outfit she wore to her first and only Reaping.

Peeta stands near me, ready to catch me, should I break down. Next to him is Prim's hope chest – a cedar box containing a few linens and her most precious treasures.

We had been back in District 12 for a week. It had been a teary goodbye. I had clung to my mother – something I thought I would never do – suddenly feeling like I needed her more than ever. I made her promise to be back home for the delivery. Once we'd arrived back in the mountains I had breathed a sigh of relief. I was home. I think Peeta had felt it, too.

At first we settled back in slowly. Peeta made fleeting trips to the bakery, satisfied that his assistants had kept shop well while we were gone but anxious to get flour back under his nails. He watched over me like a hawk, making sure I didn't slip backward. I rolled my eyes but let him hover. He was being sweet, anyway.

I had finally entered my third trimester. It was all downhill from there, Dr. Bryke said. I'd had an appointment with her a few days after we'd got back, and she'd said everything was looking picture perfect. Our baby was growing the way it should. I even got new ultrasound pictures. I was getting bigger every day, and I felt like I had a beach ball in my stomach. Peeta began waiting on me hand and foot, asking if I was comfortable every two minutes and rubbing my back and feet and being an overall annoyance. Delly said Rolan had been the same way when she had been pregnant with their first child. He's getting anxious, she'd explained. Just let him fret over you and try not to kill him. So that's what I did.

It was very difficult not to kill him.

For a week, as I waddled down the hall, I would stop in front of the door to Prim's room. One day I even put my hand on the door knob. Peeta caught me there once, lingering, and he'd put his hand on my shoulder and smiled at me. "Whenever you're ready," he'd said. I'd barked a hysterical laugh and told him I'd never really be ready, so he'd shrugged. "Let's do it then." And I had sighed and agreed.

I hold the white blouse and skirt in my hands, trying to keep my breathing steady. All I can see is her little duck tail poking out of the top of her skirt. Tears begin to cloud my eyes.

"Prim…" And then I start to shake, and Peeta's arms are around me, holding me up. He shushes me and hums, murmurs that it's okay, and eventually I calm down enough to start folding the outfit up. Peeta lets me go so that I can wrap it in paper, and I crouch down, place a kiss on the parcel, and pack it in the cedar chest. Even as a small weight lifts from my chest, I begin to cry again. The baby squirms in my belly.

"This was your Auntie Prim's room," I say, pressing my hands against my shifting stomach. "You're going to live here soon, but she'll always be here to watch over you."

Peeta's hands squeeze my shoulders, giving me the strength to go on.

"This was the dress she wore to her first Reaping," I find myself saying. "She wore it the day your father and I met."

Peeta's hands squeeze again, and I know if I turned and looked I would see him remembering that blond little head moving toward the stage of in front of the Justice Building…

"Her shirt wouldn't stay tucked in. I called her 'Little Duck.' I bet I'll be chasing you around one day to tuck your shirt in, too."

And then I turn back to the closet to start all over again.

I work slowly throughout the day, tucking each item into the chest with a story to my unborn child about its aunt. I want them to be born knowing her, knowing that she will watch over them as they sleep in this room.

Peeta provides his help when he knows I need it, holding me, telling his own stories of Prim when I cannot speak. His memories of her are new to me, and I listen with rapt attention, sobbing quietly as he tells our child about buying the cheese she made with her goats milk, or about how kind she was to everyone. The baby stirs in my womb, turning towards the sound of our voices. And when the last of her things are finally packed away, and we stand in the middle of an empty room, I begin to sing.

_"Deep in the meadow, under the willow…"_

* * *

 

** Week 28 **

Peeta sets the buckets on the floor and straightens with a groan, trying to work out the crick in his back.

"We're gonna be old before she's even in school!" he proclaims, and I roll my eyes and finish unwrapping the paint rollers.

"You're only 32," I tell him. "And what are you going to do if it ends up being a boy?"

Peeta laughs. "Repaint the walls, I guess."

I eye him warily. "I said not to get pink. I hate pink."

"Relax." He kneels down and starts popping the lids off the paint cans, revealing a variety of colors. Blues and yellows and greens and yes, even pinks. He grins up at me. "You said you wanted spring," he says. "So I bought spring."

I can't help smiling at him. I knew he'd want to turn the walls into a canvas.

"Are we just going to throw it at the walls then?" I ask. We'd both seen rooms painted like that in the Capitol. But he shakes his head.

"No. Most of it's a surprise. We'll just paint the basecoat today."

He pulls over a few cans of plain white paint to go over the dull yellow that is on the walls. I purse my lips at him but grab a brush.

I discover that painting is difficult when you're seven months pregnant. My large belly keeps hitting the wall, leaving "baby prints" (as Peeta calls them) along the room. After a while I grow so frustrated that I throw down my brush, which splashes paint on me. Peeta nearly falls off of the ladder laughing. Angry at him, I throw my brush at him, hitting him square in the chest and leaving a huge smear of paint down his front. The look in his eyes signals that I have begun a war, and I don't make it very far before he has me around the middle and is smearing paint all over my clothes and skin. I try my best to retaliate. It is about that time that Haymitch walks in.

"Would you two knock it off," he grumbles. "You're gonna make me lose my lunch."

Peeta and I separate, like we've been caught doing something we shouldn't. Haymitch has a way of doing that to us. I look at our mentor, and I frown. Something about the way he looks tells me something is wrong. Peeta sees it, too.

"What is it?" he asks, and Haymitch's frown deepens.

"Effie screwed up," he says. "Let it slip to someone about the get together at Annie's."

My stomach jumps to my throat. Oh no.

"I expect you'll be getting a phone call here shortly from Plutarch Heavensbee. I already did."

Peeta frowns, the lines on his forehead becoming more pronounced. "What does he want?"

"An interview. It is the 15th Anniversary, after all." He chuckles hollowly. "Nice timing. How is the little sea monkey today?"

I glare at him. "Active." The baby delivers a jab to my liver as I speak. From downstairs, the phone begins to ring. Peeta and I both jump. Haymitch just laughs.

"Told ya."

Peeta sighs and rushes off to go answer it. I grab a rag and start trying to wipe off some of the paint on my skin.

"Effie called to tell me she was sorry," Haymitch mumbles after a moment or two. I shake my head.

"It's not her fault," I say. "She didn't mean it." I throw down the rag when I realize nothing but a hot shower will take the paint off. "Besides, I'm surprised it didn't happen sooner."

He nods, fumbling with his pocket. He's debating taking a drink. I narrow my eyes.

"I meant it, you know. You're not drinking around my child."

He throws his hands up. "I ain't touched it, woman! Not in a whole hour! Though I sure as hell need it."

I shake my head, then grimace as the baby does a one-two punch to my gut from the inside. Haymitch frowns. "She beatin' you up?"

I nod and hold out my hand. He eyes me warily. "What the hell are you gonna do?"

"Just give me your hand," I snap. Grudgingly, he holds it out, and I take the gnarled old hand and place it on my belly, pushing just a little. The baby kicks back. Haymitch yanks his hand away like he's been burned.

"Spooky as fuck," he mutters, and I nod my head in agreement.

Peeta appears in the doorway, looking worn out. "They're coming to do interviews. Tomorrow."

I feel like I might vomit. The whole country is going to see me fat and pregnant. Great.

"Did you even try to tell them no?" I snap. Peeta gives me a weary 'of course I did' look, and Haymitch shrugs.

"Looks like there's no helping it, sweetheart," he says. "Whole nation'll get to see you in all your knocked up glory."

I contemplate punching him, but I settle for letting my eyebrow twitch and clenching my fists.

Peeta frowns. "Katniss, think about your blood pressure."

"Screw my blood pressure. You," I jab my finger at Haymitch, "Out."

He doesn't resist; just chuckles gruffly to himself as he walks out of the room and down the stairs. Peeta sidles up to me, careful of my temper. "You've got paint in your hair," he tells me.

I punch him in the arm.

* * *

 

The prep team arrives early. Peeta and I hadn't gotten much sleep the night before, wondering what on earth the interview would be like, how much they would want to talk about the Games and the Rebellion. Knowing Plutarch, it could be anything. We ended up sitting on the sofa downstairs, drinking tea and talking about anything other than the interview. When the knock came on the door, we both sighed and grudgingly began the day.

I'm surprised when my old prep team walks through the door. They look more altered than ever: Flavius has traded in his orange corkscrew curls for bright purple braids; Venia has grown out her hair in a single stripe down her head, but her gold tattoos are as fresh as ever; Octavia is still plump, but her skin has gone from pale pea green to a deep magenta, so that she looks like she's a bright flower, or constantly blushing. They squeak in delight when they see me, fawn over my baby belly and chatter about how wonderful it is that I'm going to have a baby, but then they go on about how awful it must be to be fat for nine whole months. I see Peeta frown deeply, but I shake my head. People in the Capitol will always be this way.

They remake us, bringing us back to Beauty Base Zero before adding small touches here and there They squirm when they go about removing all of my body hair again, scolding me for not keeping up with myself. I apologize half-heartedly and they instantly forgive me. I hear Peeta complaining across the hall about there being no need to wax his chest, and I'm glad he stands up to Flavius. Not that it's hard. In the end we look young and fresh again. They've covered the bags under our eyes and have minimized the scars on our arms and necks. They have picked out our best clothes and made us wear them: a gauzy yellow dress from Effie for me, and a blue shirt and slacks for Peeta. I plea to stay barefoot, since my feet are so swollen, and they barely agree.

Plutarch arrives as soon as we're ready, his camera crew in tow. I try not to frown. We carried out this routine five years ago on the Tenth Anniversary, and I disliked it then, too. He comes in with wide arms and greets us boisterously. I keep the smile plastered to my face.

"Katniss," he exclaims, "You look absolutely radiant! Congratulations to the both of you!"

Peeta takes his place as our family's mouthpiece, thanking him more warmly than I could have done. Plutarch goes on.

"I hope you all are excited for this year's anniversary. We have big things in store for New Panem."

"We can't wait to see the special," Peeta lies. We rarely turn on our TV, except for these specials. I'm curious to see what these 'big things' are.

"How about we get started?" he says, taking a seat in an arm chair. The camera crew scatters around the living room, and Peeta and I have no choice but to sit on the sofa next to each other. I try my best to get comfortable; this could take a while.

The red light begins to flash on the camera behind Plutarch's head, and he begins.

"First off, may I say 'Congratulations, Mellarks!' This is a wonderful surprise for myself and, I'm sure, all of New Panem."

Peeta and I both thank him. Plutarch's face splits into a smile. "It's been five years since we last visited District 12," he says. "Tell us – what have you been up to since then?"

Peeta is in prime form as he talks about the bakery and the medicine factory. I manage to mumble about teaching school children the songs my father taught me. Plutarch tries to turn the conversation towards the pregnancy, or how we've moved on from our losses, but Peeta steers him away firmly.

"That's something we'd like to keep personal," he says with a smile to melt the audience. He looks at me and squeezes my hand. "Something for just the two of us."

I can hear the nation collectively go 'awww', but I smile back. I even caress my belly for good measure. Plutarch seems to be sated with that. He moves on to talking about the "reunion", as he calls it, in District 4.

"It's so wonderful to see such camaraderie between former Victors and members of the Star Squad. What was the occasion?"

"It was just a vacation," Peeta says. "Katniss felt cooped up, so we thought the sea would be a nice place to visit."

"And the other Victors?"

"They're our friends," I say, trying to keep the edge out of my voice. "We enjoy seeing each other, but don't get many opportunities." I place a hand on my belly. "So we had a baby shower."

Plutarch grins; he knows I'm lying, but he'll take it because it sounds so perfect. "How nice that must have been. And I hear you saw your mother, who now lives in District 4?"

I nod, my jaw tightening. "Yes, she works as a nurse at the new hospital there." I swallow. "She helps patients that suffered mentally after the war."

"What a noble and kindhearted woman," he muses. "Obviously you take after her." I nod, and he motions to the cameras.

"It was lovely to speak with you both," he says. "Much luck to you in the future, and again, congratulations on your new addition!" We thank him again, and Plutarch gestures to the cameras and the red lights go off. I'm in a state of mild surprise. That's it? Peeta voices my thoughts.

"That was shorter than usual," he comments, standing to shake Plutarch's hand. The older man waves the statement away.

"People are getting tired of the past," he explains. "They want bigger, brighter things!"

I narrow my eyes. "Not more Games, I hope."

Plutarch winks at me. "Not to the death, my dear Mockingjay, but for Victory." When I blanch, he continues in a scholarly way. "Before Panem, the world would gather to compete in events that tested their skill and strength. We've decided to bring back those Games, not to divide our nation, but to bring it together in the spirit of Victory! Each District will compete." He claps his hands together. "The nation will love it!"

I'm not buying it. "What kind of events?"

"Archery, for instance. Wrestling. Swimming. Sports, Mrs. Mellark. Competitive sports. No more killing or death. A safe and harmless display of skill and prowess."

I mull it over. It sounds just like the Hunger Games to me, but a glance at Peeta says he finds the idea intriguing.

"As long as we can stay at home," he jokes, and Plutarch laughs and says his goodbyes. I shut the door behind him and his crew with a sigh.

"More Games? Really?"

Peeta sighs. "I sorta like the idea. No one would be forced. People won't die. It'd be like wrestling in school."

I purse my lips. I still don't know. But if Peeta sees the good in it, then it must have potential somewhere. Uniting the nation with archery and wrestling? I shake my head. It sounds like another typical Plutarch scheme.

But oddly enough, I can't help feeling like it's not a bad idea.

Peeta spends the next two days shut up in the nursery, painting the walls in all of his varied colors. He refuses to open to door to me, insisting it will be a surprise, but I manage to make him open the windows to let in some fresh air before waddling over to Delly's. The baby inside of me barely stirs, rocked to sleep by the motion of walking. It's most active at night, I've noticed, when I'm trying to sleep. I feel it turn as I move down the street. It favors its right side, just like Peeta. I smile to myself, but that underlying terror ripples through me. I hope to all that is good that this child takes after my husband –someone kind and selfless. Someone that doesn't have my darkness.

My musings bring me to Delly's farm without my being aware of it. Woken from my distractions, I knock on the door quietly, in case Cole is asleep. I can hear the other children in the field above the house, their squeals rising over the cornstalks. Delly answers the door, smiling widely. I wasn't expected, but she doesn't seem to mind.

"Come in!" she says, and since her voice isn't hushed I know Cole isn't asleep. "I just put on some tea, would you like a cup?"

I nod and slip inside. I see Cole lying on a blanket in the living room floor, his small arms waving in the air. His eyes are transfixed on the ceiling fan that turns above him. I ask Delly if that's normal.

"Oh, he'll stare at it all day if you let him," she says. "Babies love the ceiling fan, I don't know why." She invites me to take a seat on the sofa, and I gladly oblige, propping up my feet on an ottoman and sighing in relief. Delly chuckles.

"Almost done, dear," she says, picking Cole up off the floor and cooing at him. My throat tightens, the terror returning.

"Delly-"

She sits next to me. "You're scared?"

I swallow and nod. "Not of the delivery, I can handle the pain, I think." I shake my head and look down at baby Cole, who sucks on his fist. "I'm… I have no idea how to do anything. I don't even know how to change a diaper!"

Delly laughs, high and merry. I frown. "Oh, Katniss. Here, I'll show you." She stands and lays Cole on the ottoman and unbuttons his onesie. "Like this. Sit up and watch. He probably needs to be changed anyway." She takes my hands and puts them on the diaper. "See? He's a little wet. He'd have started fussing soon."

I nod and pull my hands back. "I don't think-"

"You'll have to do it sooner or later; better you know how now." She pulls a fresh cloth diaper from a nearby laundry basket and holds it up. "You fold it like this," she says, and folds it in half diagonally. "Then, you tuck it under the old one… Go on, lift up his legs." When I hesitate, she takes the baby's ankles and lifts up his whole lower body like it's a wet noodle, and slides the new diaper under the baby's rear end. I am surprised at how flexible the infant's body is.

"Now, you do the rest," she instructs, and hands me a cloth wipe. I stare at my new advisary: a diaper change. I take a deep breath and steel myself. C'mon, Katniss, it's now or never.

First things first. I remove the safety pins that hold the diaper on. I manage to do so without jabbing anyone. I glance up and find that Cole is watching me, almost studying me. Judging, I think. The sentience in his eyes frightens me. I certainly hope my child doesn't judge me like that. I frown at the baby and refocus on the job at hand. I pull the old diaper away, expecting the worst, but he's only wet himself. Delly lays a cloth over his genitalia, and gives me a look. "You have to be careful with boys," she explains, and the look on my face makes her laugh. I frown at her and then at the baby, and carefully wipe around his bottom and between his legs, and Cole fidgets at the coolness of the wipe. Then I fold the new diaper around him and pin it and then sit back and sigh.

"There."

Delly grins and reaches to pick the baby up. The diaper slides down his legs and to the floor. She laughs.

"Close, but not quite," she giggles, and lays Cole down and effortlessly re-diapers him. "You have to put it on tight. They puff out their bellies sometimes. But you did a great job, Katniss. Now you'll be able to teach Peeta."

I sigh and lean back into the sofa, unconsciously rubbing my hands across my belly. Delly sits next to me and cradles Cole, smiling down at his pudgy form.

"All the fear goes away once they're born," she says quietly. "Well, not all of it. You spend most of your life trying to keep them safe. But once you hold them for the first time…" She looks at me and smiles. "It makes all of the fear go away. It makes it worth it."

I hope to god she's right.


	9. Weeks 29 & 31

** Week 29 **

"Keep your eyes shut."

I roll my closed eyes. "I am!" Peeta puts his hands over my eyes anyway. I hear the door open and he leads me into the room.

"Ready?"

I sigh, though my heart is racing. "Peeta—"

He laughs and removes his hands, but I keep my eyes shut. I'm afraid to look, to see it changed. Peeta puts his arms around me as best as he can. "You can open them now."

I do, and all the air in my lungs leaves in a strangled sigh. "Oh, Peeta…"

He has painted spring. Somehow, he has brought the outdoors in. Flowers and trees dusted with new leaves surround us. The ceiling is painted blue with clouds so real I want to reach out and touch them. But what catches my eye is the little pond he's painted, and the little ducks swimming in it. Tears fill my eyes and blur my vision into colors.

"You kept her here."

He hugs me to him, resting his chin on my shoulder. "I did my best," he whispers. I interlace my fingers with his, tears rolling down my cheeks.

"It's perfect."

"I asked Haymitch to help us move the crib and things in. We can do it this afternoon."

I nod. "We can finish it."

He kisses me just below my ear, breathing me in. I sigh and lean into him, unable to take my eyes off of the mother duck and her two yellow babies.

Haymitch comes over later for lunch. After ham and bean soup they start moving baby things upstairs. Our mentor grumbles and groans about his age, but I know he's still strong enough to move a crib. I'd help, but I'm not allowed to do any heavy lifting. Instead I direct traffic, deciding the layout of the room. Dresser against the far wall, changing table by the window. I busy myself with putting clothes in the drawers and stocking diapers in the changing table. Sunlight streams in the window, warming my skin. August is drawing to a close. We won't have many warm days left. Soon the leaves will start to change. I collapse into my new rocking chair and stare out the window, taking a break from folding up little socks and onesies. I feel weary and worn out. My feet are swollen and my hips hurt with the strain of supporting so much unfamiliar weight. I must sigh pretty loudly, because I eventually become aware that I'm being watched. My head snaps around, startled, and I find my husband and my mentor staring at me, emotions playing over their faces. I frown, uncomfortable with being eyed so blatantly.

"What?"

Haymitch is the first to snap out of it and speak.

"I'll be damned," he mutters, as if suddenly he's realized something. He shakes his head and reaches into his pocket and takes a swig from his flask before I can protest.

"You looked different for a second there, sweetheart," he grumbles, and for a moment I think he'll break character and say something sweet (god forbid), but he just squints at me. "I hadn't realized how fat you'd gotten."

I scowl, and so does Peeta, who until then had still been staring with that look of intense concentration, like he's drawing in his head. Haymitch chuckles, and gives the crib a kick.

"Seems sturdy enough," he says, and he heads out the door, probably to steal some food. I look at Peeta.

"You look beautiful," he says. "He's an ass."

"I dunno. I am pretty fat." I rub the belly that sticks out before me like I'm hiding a watermelon in my dress. Peeta laughs and steps up to me and kneels down before my rocking chair, smiling up at me. I smile back, and he places his hands on my belly, the look of wonder he always gets when he does this plastered on his face.

"Two and a half more months," he whispers. "And then she'll be here." He looks up at me. "We'll be a family."

I can't help but tear up at his words. I would give anything to have a family again.

Two and a half more months.

That terror overtakes me, making me choke and clutch Peeta's hand. He kisses mine.

"Nervous?"

"Terrified." I swallow. "What if…what if they're like me?"

He frowns slightly. "What do you mean?"

"I mean…" I bite my lip and answer in a small voice. "Selfish. I'm so selfish, Peeta. I don't want them to be like me."

"Katniss…" He kisses my wrist and sighs. This is an old and worn out topic. "You're not selfish. Protective, yes. Passionate, definitely. I want our child to be like that, don't you? I want her to be like you more than anything. She'll be perfect."

"I'm not perfect," I scold.

"No," he says matter-of-factly, but then he smiles. "But you're perfect for me. And I want our child to be strong like you, and kind and loving like I know you are deep down."

I frown. I think it's a load of bull sometimes, the things he says. But if he believes them, then I have to, too.

"I'm afraid of being a mother," I whisper. He smiles softly.

"You'll be a wonderful mother," he says. "Better than mine. Better than yours." He smiles through the dark memories. "Better than Delly, even."

That makes me smile. "I guess we'll find out in two and a half months," I say, gripping his hand.

Two and a half more terror and anxiety-filled months.

* * *

 

**Week 31**

I examine myself in the mirror, turning to the side to see how my stomach expands outward. I am naked, and I frown at the stretch marks on my skin. My belly button is starting to protrude, and I run my finger around it and try to push it back in. It pops right back out, and I sigh.

Behind me, Peeta sleeps, his arms hanging off he bed and his mouth catching flies as he snores. He only snores this loudly after we make love. I smile to myself. It took some maneuvering, and we had to be very careful, but we made it work. I feel so big, and the warmth seeping through the window had made my body feel so heavy, and I had turned to him hoping for some relief. Thankfully, Peeta loves me enough to oblige. I don't think he could ever really say no. He says I'm beautiful, maybe more so than usual because I'm pregnant. He says I glow. My eyes skim over my face in the mirror. My cheeks are rosy, but they look splotchy to me, like I've just run a mile. I smirk.

I should probably get dressed, but it's still early. I don't have to be at the school until ten. I agreed to teach a few songs to the children in the District last week. Thom put me up to it. I suppose I don't really mind. I've done it before. I'm just nervous, like always.

I sigh, and then realize that it's gotten quiet. I glance behind me in the mirror and find that Peeta is watching me sleepily from the bed. His hair is mussed and hangs in his view. His eyes squint, just a sliver of blue visible, and I smile at his reflection.

"What?"

He just hums contentedly, low in his throat so that it sounds like a rumble. I love how rough his voice is in the morning. He smiles at me and reaches out his hand. I turn and go to him, taking his hand and pressing a kiss to it as I sit on the edge of the bed. I brush his hair out of his eyes.

"You need a haircut," I tell him, smiling. He does, but I love the curls he has when his hair grows out.

He nods, then squints at me again, like he's trying to focus. My eyebrows draw together.

"What's wrong?"

He squints and unsquints, and says, "I think I might need glasses."

I nod, not really surprised. I've noticed him squinting at his recipes lately, and sometimes at me when I'm across the room.

"We'll make an appointment at the clinic," I tell him. "How bad is it?"

He shakes his head. "Not awful. I can see you just fine. But when you're on the other side of the room you're a little fuzzy around the edges. It's kind of crept up, I guess."

I nod, and he shrugs and yawns, then reaches out to place a hand on my belly.

"How is she this morning?"

"Still asleep," I say, putting my hand next to his. He smiles, his eyes softening.

"We should start thinking about names," he says. "Don't you think?"

"I guess," I reply, and Peeta chuckles, rubbing my belly.

"You want to wait till she's born? I mean we could, but it's probably not a good idea."

"Or he. We have to think of boys names, too."

He nods, thinking to himself. After a moment, he says, "After your father?"

I smile sadly. "Or yours." But immediately I am loathe to do it. There is too much sadness associated with those names.

"We'll talk about it later," Peeta murmurs, seeing the darkness pass over my face. He sits up, the sheet pooling in his lap and barely covering his nakedness. I smile to myself, and he catches it.

"See something you like?" he smirks. I roll my eyes.

"You should get dressed," I tell him. "You'll need to be at the bakery soon."

He sighs and stretches his legs, rubbing at where his mechanical leg attaches to his flesh to loosen the muscles. I move so that he can roll out of bed and go to the closet. I might go into the woods this morning. Not far, but just enough so that I might get a squirrel or two for dinner. It's getting to be almost impossible to shoot my bow these days, so I'm trying to use it as long as I can. But when I reach for my hunting clothes, Peeta frowns.

"You're not going out, are you?" he asks, pulling on his own work clothes. I shrug.

"I wanted to get something for dinner," I tell him, but his frown doesn't go away, and I feel my own lip pull down. "What? Can I not do that anymore?"

He stiffens, preparing himself for an argument. "That's not what I said –"

"It's what you implied," I snap. "I'm going hunting."

"Katniss, you're seven months pregnant. You shouldn't be traipsing across a mountainside –"

"Well what am I supposed to do, then? Hunt in our backyard?"

"Yes, now that you mention it. At least Haymitch can keep an eye on you."

I laugh hollowly. "You're joking!"

"Go to the Hob, then," he continues, and I just stare at him in disbelief. He pulls his shirt over his head and then fixes me with his most serious look. It makes me freeze, but only for a second.

"Katniss –"

"No, don't you 'Katniss' me."

"– please. Something could go wrong. You could get hurt, you could go into labor –"

"I'm only seven months!"

"—And Dr. Bryke said it could happen. Please don't give me that look. I'm just worried."

"I can take care of myself, Peeta," I snap. I can't believe he's doing this. I'm a grown woman. I can handle the woods. It's not like I was planning to go far, anyway, just deep enough to run across a few squirrels. What trouble could I possibly get into?

"You can't order me to stay in bed all day, Peeta," I say, trying not to raise my voice, but I hear it hitch. "I'm not an invalid!"

His jaw tightens, a sign that he's reaching the end of his rope, but I'll be damned if I let him keep me cooped up in this house this morning.

"I'm going out," I tell him. "And you can't stop me." And I finish getting dressed. Peeta sighs in frustration.

"Then I'm coming with you."

I stare at him. "Now you're really joking."

He shakes his head and changes his shirt. "No, I'm not." He fixes me with that serious look again. "I just don't want you getting hurt or for something to go wrong. There's a million and one things that could."

I just shake my head in disbelief. "You'll scare away any game."

"I'll be quiet."

I roll my eyes and grab my boots. "Right." I sit on the bed and pull on the worn leather shoes – or try to. My feet are swollen. I curse under my breath.

"Can't get your boots on?" Peeta says, sounding hopeful. I cram my foot into the boot, hiding the wince.

"I don't know what you're talking about," I say, and I stand and walk out the door. Unfortunately, Peeta follows, and I frown. I grab my bow and quiver and head out the back door, and he is right behind me, determined to ruin my morning. Halfway across the backyard I stop and pivot, glaring at him.

"Would you just leave me alone?"

He gives me a 'yeah, right' look, complete with raised eyebrows. I voice my frustration as a growl, and spin around and start marching. To my annoyance, he follows me out to the treeline. I pause under the first spread of branches to string my bow, and he waits with crossed arms. We both know that this could go on all day – we're both too stubborn to back down. But I'm not going home until I have a few squirrels in my bag, so I set off into the brush, and Peeta stomps after me. I grumble and pick my way over fallen logs and stones, much more careful than usual. The baby weight throws me off, and I'm furious that I have to stop a few hundred yards in and rest on a stone outcrop. Peeta watches me with a smug look, and I scowl at him.

"Sit down," I snap. "And shut up."

Surprisingly, he obliges and takes a seat next to me. He doesn't speak, just makes himself comfortable. I know what game he's playing. He's waiting for me to admit that he's right. But I won't. Instead, I notch an arrow and settle in to wait. Squirrel hunting is best done on the move, but even I'm getting too noisy, so this will have to do. Thankfully, luck is on my side. Within an hour, two squirrels skitter by, and I take them both through the eye. Peeta sighs.

"Can we go home now?"

I can't help it. I laugh.

* * *

 

District 12's schoolhouse is bigger than when it first opened after the revolution. We have more families now, and the schoolyard is visible proof of that. Children climb over a variety of playsets that fathers have built for them. There are roughly 200 of them in all. It's a lot to teach, but I've done it before. I just wish the nerves had disappeared with the experience.

I meet one of the teachers at the fence. She's an older woman, not originally from 12, but she's kind and loves our district and our children, and I enjoy working with her. Her name is Ms. Lee, and she smiles when she sees me approach.

"Mrs. Mellark! So good to see you!" She shakes my hand and opens the gate for me. Some of the younger children see me and come running up with grins on their faces, to pull on my skirt and chatter questions.

"Are we going to sing today?"

"Mrs. Mellark, is Mr. Mellark going to bring us treats?"

"When are you gonna have your baby?"

I just smile and say hello. Ms. Lee laughs and blows on the whistle around her neck. The children grudgingly line up and head back inside, and Ms. Lee and I follow them. She smiles over her shoulder at me and asks how I'm doing, how the baby is doing. I smile politely and respond, saying the usual, "Oh, fine, the baby's fine. Always moving, keeping me up at night." Usually the older women smile widely and start recounting their own experiences. Ms. Lee smiles, but there's sadness at the edges. And then I remember: she's from 13. She must not be able to have her own children. I feel a strange wave of guilt wash over me, guilt that here I am, the evidence of fruitfulness bulging out in front of me, and this loving woman is barren. I try not to frown at the unfairness of it. This must be why she teaches. They're her children, too.

"That's wonderful," she says, and I smile despite my guilt and follow her into the gymnasium. The students have all assembled and are sitting on the floor in lines, while the other teachers watch like sentries on the edges. They all smile when they see me. The kids start to chatter and Ms. Lee blows her whistle to quiet them. They instantly fall silent. I smirk. Typical District 13 precision.

"Children," she announces in the silence, "today we have a special guest. Mrs. Mellark is here to sing to us and to teach us some new songs. Please welcome her."

The students cheer and clap, and I smile and blush and step up to the chair that has been provided for me.

"Good morning," I say, and they all murmur back. I take a deep breath and start my class.

I begin with the valley song, the one Peeta heard me sing that day so long ago. I've taught it to these students already, and their voices join mine easily. I can hear a few of the older teens carry the tune with stronger voices, but I can also pick out a few younger ones. When the song concludes, I pick up another, this time a new one, to teach to them. First I sing a line and have them repeat it back to me, and then the next line, until they can sing a whole verse by themselves. I teach them three new songs in the next hour.

The old Katniss of fifteen years ago would have balked at having to teach songs to schoolchildren, but I find a strange peace in it. It brings my father back, and his gift. I discovered that I actually like doing this, the first time I did it. And now, I have a surprise for them. One I've already discussed with the teachers, something they're very excited about.

"The Harvest Festival is next month," I say, loud enough so that they can all hear me. I try to ignore my voice cracking. "I'd like for us to put on a concert."

It was Peeta's suggestion, really. After the last time I'd taught them songs, I had come home trying to think of something to build them up to. I wanted to do some kind of performance, and it had been Peeta that remembered the Harvest Festival in October. We started the celebration a year or two after returning to 12, when our first crops came in, and it's become a highly anticipated party every year. There's food and dancing and music, and it would be the perfect time for a concert. It was daunting at first, but the whole plan eventually came to me, and I feel anxious and excited all at once.

The students seem to feel the same. They chatter and talk amongst themselves, and the teachers have to blow their whistles to quiet them. I grin and continue, my stomach fluttering.

"I'm going to put together three groups by age, and we'll all sing some songs for the Festival. How does that sound?"

They all cheer and clap and nod. My chest swells.

It's funny how it's taken me so long to find my place in our rebuilt district, but I know now that this is it. I feel like my father would be proud.


	10. Weeks 33, 35, & 36

** Week 33 **

Peeta shoves his new glasses up the bridge of his nose with his forearm, then goes back to kneading the dough on the counter in front of him. I smile and pop a crumb of bread into my mouth. I've spent a lot of time at the bakery this week, helping Peeta get ready for the Harvest Festival. We all have a million and one things to do before the big event, and the district is humming with energy.

"Phoned your mother yet?" Peeta asks, dusting flour from his hands onto the freshly formed loaf before him. I sigh and shake my head.

"I was going to, but I've been busy…" My tongue stalls. I have no good excuse, not really, and he knows it.

"Katniss, you might want to do that. Dr. Bryke said the baby could technically be here any day now." It's hard to miss the flash of excitement in his eyes as he says this. I sigh again.

"I know. I'll call her right now." I reach out my hand and he pulls me out of the chair, kissing my forehead and rubbing my protruding belly before nudging me toward the phone. I scowl at him, but he just chuckles and goes back to the counter.

"Call her," he says.

I stare at the phone in apprehension. Talking to my mother is still awkward, despite our surprisingly good reunion in District 4, but I manage to pick up the receiver and dial the number. She picks up on the third ring.

"Hello?"

My throat is suddenly dry. I choke on my tongue for a few minutes before managing to sputter, "Hey, Mom?"

I hear her suck in her breath on the other end. "Katniss? Is everything alright?"

"Everything's fine." I take a deep breath. "I was just… Dr. Bryke said the baby will be coming soon. I was wondering - maybe you should – could head to District 12 soon."

There is silence, and then she clears her throat. "Of course. I'll have to sort things down here, set the nurses up for a month or two…"

I nod, even though I know she can't see it. "That's fine. Just call and let me – us - know what train you'll be in on, and we'll get you from the station."

I think she nods on the other end, and then she says quietly, "I'll see you in about a week then."

"Alright. Bye."

She says goodbye and the line goes dead. I sigh and put the receiver back on its cradle, then slump against the wall. Peeta glances over and smirks at me, and I just scowl right back.

* * *

 

I'm doing laundry when the first cramp comes. I frown, pausing from folding one of Peeta's shirts to feel my belly. It lasts only a second or two, and doesn't really hurt – it's just uncomfortable. I know it's nothing serious – Braxton something or other contractions, Dr. Bryke called them. Practice contractions. The baby squirms in response to it; I think it's starting to feel claustrophobic in there. I know I shouldn't worry about it and just go back to the laundry, but suddenly I can't do it. I'm frozen. Because this means it's gone from "soon" to "any day now."

I could have this baby any day now.

Fear seizes my body and my breath comes short. I think I might be having a panic attack. I grip Peeta's shirt, but fearful that I might rip it to shreds, I throw it into the basket and stand as quickly as I can and begin to pace back and forth in the living room, trying not to hyperventilate. Peeta. I need Peeta. But he's at the bakery, too far to walk right now. So I guess I'll have to settle for our neighbor.

I yank on my coat and hurry out the back door. I can see Haymitch sitting on his back porch, smoking a pipe and watching his geese peck through the dying grass and leaves. His eyes turn to me when he hears the back door slam, and he frowns like I've disturbed him. I just scowl and trudge across the yard, taking a seat on his porch when I reach it and crossing my arms. He watches me for a minute, then shakes his head.

"Problem, sweetheart?"

"I can't do this," I spit out, the words sour on my tongue. "I can't."

He chuckles, a rough and scratchy bark of a laugh. "Little late for that."

"I know that!" I snap, then wrap my arms tighter around myself. "But I just can't. I'm not ready."

He sucks on his pipe and blows sweet-smelling smoke into the brisk air. "Don't know what to tell ya, sweetheart. Ain't my problem."

"The hell it isn't your problem!" I glare at him. "You're my mentor! Mentor me! What do I do?"

He sighs. "Sweetheart, I don't know jack shit about kids except how to dress 'em up to die. You don't want my advice."

I bite my lip. He's right, of course. I probably don't want his advice. But in the meantime, I need someone to talk me down, and I don't want Peeta's overly sweet and protective manner. I want flat out honesty. And Haymitch is guaranteed to give me that.

"Was I stupid to agree to this?" I ask in a small voice, not looking at him. I hear him shift, uncomfortable, and more smoke drifts through the air.

"Maybe," he croaks. "But I'm biased. Your spawn's guaranteed to be a bigger pain in my ass than you an' the boy combined."

My lips quirk, but the fear won't shake. He sighs.

"Look, go talk to your husband or Delly or somebody. Leave me the hell alone, would ya? This ain't my problem."

"It isn't a problem," I snap, and he raises a sardonic eyebrow.

"You complaining says otherwise."

I turn away and grumble, "I'm just… scared."

He makes a sound in his throat like a laugh, but it's bitter. "The great Katniss Everdeen, scared of her own spawn—"

"Stop calling it that! It's a person."

"Yeah, well, that would explain it, then. You can't handle people, so you think you won't be able to handle your own kid."

That might be it, but I can't be sure. Haymitch sighs again.

"Sweetheart… ain't nobody in this world knows how to love somebody better than you and the boy. You'll do just fine."

I whip my head around and stare at him, unable to believe that something so well-meaning has come out of his mouth. But he just puffs on his pipe and watches his geese like it didn't happen. I sigh and nod, and watch the fat white birds waddle around the yard with him until Peeta gets home. That's how it is with us. He acts fatherly and then we never speak of it. So when Peeta comes looking for me, I just tell him I needed to get some fresh air. Haymitch grumbles some response to Peeta's greeting and waves him off, and we head back to the house. He questions me the second we're inside, and I sigh and tell him. He doesn't seem happy that I didn't call him.

"Over one little cramp? I didn't see the point." I leave out that it scared me witless. He doesn't need to know about that.

"It's a big thing, Katniss," he says. "I want to know when stuff like this happens."

I sigh. "I'm sorry. I'll call next time." This seems to be an appropriate response, and he smiles and embraces me from the side, since I'm too big to hold from the front. I kiss him, feeling the fear start to dissipate like it always does when I'm in his arms. It's too late to change anything anyway.

* * *

 

** Week 35 **

" _Come all ye fair and tender ladies_  
Be careful how you court young men  
They're like a bright star on summer's evening  
They'll first appear and then they're gone…"

I hum the rest of the tune as I walk around the kitchen table, setting down plates for dinner. Peeta comes into the kitchen, bundled up in his winter coat, a scarf, and a hat, and I scowl at him. The weather has finally cooled down to that of fall, and despite this, I'm suffering from an Indian summer, hot flashes plaguing me all hours of the day. I'm barefoot in a loose skirt and a blouse that has most of its buttons undone so that my swollen breasts can get some air. Peeta doesn't complain too much, just bundled up when I told him I was sweating to death and opened up all of the windows and then kept his mouth shut. I try not to scowl too much when I see him shivering, but I'm too the point that I'm so irritable that I scowl at just about everything, including my husband. My wonderful husband, who puts up with all of my scowls. Which is why I've made him dinner tonight.

"Something smells good," he says, smiling at me. He even pulls off his scarf and hat. Blond curls stick up at random. "What's the occasion?"

I go up to him and kiss his cheek, awkwardly wrapping my arms around him from the side. He kisses my forehead and then kneels down before me and puts his hands on my belly, pushing open my blouse to lay a kiss on the baby, which squirms visibly. I can't help but let out a small groan at the movement. Every kick and twist that the baby makes these days is an effort. I can feel it struggle around in there, conscious of the growing lack of space. It's ready to be out, and I'd have to say that the feeling is mutual. I feel like I'm ready to explode.

"I'm sorry I've been so grumpy lately," I tell Peeta as he straightens. He just smiles and shakes his head.

"It's all right. I'd be grumpy too if I had a baby kicking me in the kidneys all day."

I want to sigh at how well he seems to understand, but what he's saying is an understatement. It's more like having a battering ram attacking my spine day in and day out, but he doesn't need to know the specifics.

"Well, I felt bad, so I wanted to make you a nice dinner." I steer him towards the table and he sits down in his chair, smiling at me expectantly. I go to the stove and retrieve the skillet of grilled fish that I have prepared with lemon and herbs and dish a fillet out onto his plate. He grins at me.

"You've outdone yourself," he teases, and I fix him with a look before filling my own plate. It takes me a moment to lower into my chair, what with all my awkward bulk, and I sigh heavily when I finally manage to be seated. Peeta tries to cover up his smirk, and I glare down the table at him. If only he knew how hard it is to move around now, how long it took me to retrieve the spatula off the floor when I dropped it earlier, how annoying it is to knock things over with my stomach.

"No laughing," I snap. "You did this to me."

His eyes widen behind his glasses. "Oh, I'm sorry. I thought you wanted to be pregnant."

I frown and mutter to myself, "If I'd known it would've been this awful I wouldn't have agreed."

He stares at me a moment, and then lifts a forkful of food to his mouth. I meet his gaze, daring him to refute my statement. He has no idea. Let him carry around fifteen extra pounds all day, try to sleep comfortably, try to pick up things off the floor… I purse my lips and set down my fork.

"I was trying to be nice to you today," I mumble, and he bursts out laughing.

"Katniss, I get it. You're done being pregnant. The baby will be born soon," he says . "Then you won't have to worry about it anymore." He fixes me with a look. "That is unless you want another one." The corners of his lips twitch with amusement, and I want to throw my fork at him, but I start to laugh instead.

"Eat your fish," I tell him, and we both grin at each other and move on to other topics.

* * *

 

** Week 36 **

The Harvest Festival rolls around by the end of the week. I've spent every day at the school, teaching the students songs for our concert, but now that it's finally here, I'm nervous as hell. The schoolchildren are prepared, and I know that they will sound wonderful, but I'm still anxious. Peeta tells me I'm just nervous about my own performances, not theirs, but to be honest, I can't help but thinking every day as I send the students back to their classrooms, what would Dad think?

"He'd be proud of you," Peeta tells me one night as we lie in bed. "You're doing something that you love to do and you're sharing it with people. He'd be so proud, Katniss."

My mother says the same.

We'd picked her up a week ago at the station, and since then we've slowly been growing back together. I took her to the nursery the day after she'd arrived, and we sat in the room and cried about Prim for a while, and then cried about me having a baby and how wonderfully strange it all was. Peeta had walked in at some point and had taken one look at us and promptly left, which sent my mother and I into peals of laughter, something I hadn't heard from her in years. I had forgotten what a beautiful laugh she had. When I had told her about the Festival and the concert I was putting on with the students, she had teared up and smiled at me.

"Your father would be so proud of you, Katniss."

Now, as I gather the students up to speak to them before the festival starts, I hear their words. He'd be proud, Katniss. I think he would be, too.

I tell the children to meet at the main tent at seven thirty, then send them off to play and eat to their hearts content. Peeta puts his hand on the small of my back and grins.

"I can't wait to hear it," he says, and then we go off and visit the booths, sit on rickety wooden chairs and eat delicious food grown here in our own district. A small jumble of musicians pluck out some tunes as we feast, and there is even some dancing. When the sun sets and seven thirty rolls around, the children gather into their groups, and I step up to the front of the tent. Thankfully, Ms. Lee does the introductions, so I don't have to say anything, but I can feel everyone's eyes on me, and my pulse races. I turn my back on them and give what I hope is a smile to the youngest group of students who are to sing first. I blow a note on the pitch pipe I ordered from the Capitol, and the kids hum quietly. I take a deep breath and nod, and they all open their little mouths and start to sing.

" _Twas in the merry month of May_  
When all gay flowers were a'blooming  
Sweet William on his deathbed lay  
For the love of Barb'ry Allen..."

When the song is over, there is applause, and I turn and see what must be the whole district gathered to watch and listen. My heart nearly stops. Parents and grandparents and neighbors and friends, all come together to watch their children sing. I smile at the crowd, and from there, the concert proceeds. Each group sings two or three songs, and I even have a trio of older girls sing a ballad in harmony. By the end, the clapping is thunderous. I give my best curtsey and nearly fall off the stage, I'm so overwhelmed. I feel like I'm back on stage with Caesar Flickerman, lights and applause enough to make me dizzy. Peeta catches me, and then I'm swarmed by children and their parents, all coming over to shake my hand and thank me for the wonderful job I've done teaching them. Those old enough to remember my father – and there aren't many – talk about how much I'm like him. My mother embraces me, touches my face, and I know she is thinking of my dad.

It grows late, and the musicians return to the stage to start up the dancing. If there is one thing the people of my district know how to do, it is dance, and it is my favorite part of the festival. Peeta carefully leads me around the plywood dance floor, an obnoxious amount of space between us, thanks to my belly, and our movements are awkward and choppy. But he grins and makes me laugh with his antics. He never was a very good dancer.

The fiddle eventually dies, and we all swing to a stop and applaud. Everyone is smiles and cheerfulness, and the air hums with energy. This festival atmosphere makes me feel lighter than I am – I am free and easy for the first time in months. I laugh as Delly's husband Rolan leads their daughter in a simple dance, holding her in his arms, while Vance learns from Delly the steps to the next reel. I stand back and breath it in – the life, the love. It is my district come back, not just to life, but to its full potential. People are not just no longer starving, they are happy. They have love and laughter in their lives, something they never knew until recently. Something I had never known myself until now.

I watch my husband pass out cookies and pastry cakes to the children; his grin is infectious. He will be a wonderful father. I can imagine that my father would approve of him. He would understand my love for the dandelion in the spring, for the shining boy with the bread.

I try to imagine him here. My father always sang at the small festival the district held before the revolution. He would sing till the mockingjays listened, till everyone was silent. They would all listen to his songs of love and loss, and I would sit with him and sing, too. The songs he sang come back to me now.

They had asked me to sing earlier, but I had politely refused, saying it was too early in the evening. A school concert was one thing, but this was another. You had to wait, Dad had said, until it got quiet. When the whippoorwills started calling - that was when you pulled out the songs.

Thom finds me standing off to the side and I follow him to the stage, picking up my skirt so I don't trip on the cinderblock steps. The band – a fiddle and a banjo and a mandolin, precious instruments to us – readies themselves, and I clear my throat. Someone provides a chair, and I make myself as comfortable as I can, then take a deep breath. My father's songs come flooding back.

" _I am a poor, wayfaring stranger_  
Travellin' through this land of woe  
And there's no sickness, toil, or danger  
In that bright land to which I go…

 _I'm going to see my Father_  
I'm going home, no more to roam  
I am just going over Jordan  
I am just going over home."

In the crowd I see Peeta smiling at me, the lines around his eyes crinkling as he listens. The crowd hushes as I go on with the ballad, the words and tune pouring out of me. The baby inside of me squirms, and I pass my hand over my stomach to calm her down. When the song draws to a close, an eerie silence hangs over the crowd, the kind of hush that would follow when my father sang; but the pause lingers for only a moment before everyone starts clapping. I catch Peeta's eye and he grins at me. I find my mother next, and the sight of her tears makes me catch my breath. The baby gives a fierce kick to my gut in response, and I rub my hand over my belly again.

Hush, little one, I think. I'll sing another. And I do. I sing about five more songs before my voice tires out. Peeta meets me at the edge of the stage and kisses me in front of everyone, making me blush. My mother embraces me, saying again that my dad would be proud. The band picks back up, and Peeta kisses me again before taking Mom to the floor to swing her around. In the meantime, I waddle off to the edge of the tent and find a seat, where Delly finds me. She is beaming at me, her whole face alight.

"That was beautiful," she says, rocking baby Cole as she speaks. "Vance and Mickey won't stop singing the songs you taught them." I smile, genuinely happy that I've managed to make a positive impact somewhere. "Are you ready?" she asks, smiling, and I feel my face drain of blood.

"No," I squeak, then clear my throat. "But it doesn't matter, does it? This baby's coming whether I'm ready or not."

She nods absently. "Like I've said, you're never really ready. But Katniss," she puts a hand on my arm, "You're going to be a wonderful mother. Let yourself be excited!"

I give her a shaky smile. Am I excited? Of course, says a voice inside of me. Of course I'm excited. I wanted this, and I still want it. I'm just also terrified of being a mother. I look out and see Peeta leading my mother around the dance floor, a grin splitting his face. He's so ready to be a father, I think. And if he's ready, I can be, too.

"Have you thought of names yet?" Delly asks. I laugh.

"No. We might have one by the time it's born, but I doubt it." She laughs with me, and we spend the rest of the night chatting. Eventually, though, the party dies down, and we say goodbye to everyone and head home. After saying goodnight to my mother, who's sleeping on the sofa, Peeta and I head upstairs. As we're getting ready for bed, he comes up behind me and wraps his arms around me and rests his chin on my shoulder. We watch our reflection in the dresser mirror, and I sigh, sinking back into his body.

"I love you," he murmurs into my skin, and I breathe a sigh of relief that I hadn't known I was holding. "I love you, too," I whisper, and turn in his arms and press my lips to his, absorbing all of his hope and excitement, all of his light.

We stay up all night talking about baby names.


	11. Week 38

** Week 38 **

I waddle out into the clearing, pausing to catch my breath. The pale sunlight pokes through the clouds that dot the chill October sky and dapples the little cabin with spots of light. I flash back to another time, when I was younger and far less world-weary, and my father was still alive. I think of the first time I helped him hunt deer: crouching in the pre-dawn forest with our arrows notched, waiting, our breath making clouds in front of us. My excitement when he shot one, straight through the eye like always. My disgust at cleaning the kill, and my relief when it was over. The jubilant victory of having obtained food for our family.

I sigh at the memory and wait as my husband comes crashing through the brush behind me. He carries the picnic basket – one last hurrah before the weather officially turns cold and bitter. And before we have a squalling baby with us, I think, then touch my belly. The walk put it to sleep, the steady movement lulling its squirms and twists, but I'm sure it will wake up as soon as we settle down onto the blanket.

Peeta steps up beside me and smiles. "Okay?" he asks, and I smile and take his free hand, and we walk out into the clearing. The grass has grown a little taller and crunches beneath our feet. The world has started to die around us – leaves turning and falling, grasses dying, the air turning colder – but I have never felt more full of life. We approach the cabin. Peeta naturally begins to pull me away from it – he instinctively avoids it as a place he's not privy to; but today, I pull him back towards it. He pauses and gives me a questioning look, and I just smile softly and pull him with me. I pull the key from my pocket and unlock the door, and I step inside. Peeta hesitates, then follows me in. Slowly, carefully, like he's treading on holy ground. And I suppose in a way it is. This cabin is a shrine to my father, a place of remembrance, a memorial much like the fountain in the Square. It's also a place he's never been in before, so I understand his trepidation.

"It's okay," I tell him. "I should've brought you in a long time ago."

He smiles at me, slightly sad, and I shrug. It's the truth. There's nothing in here that he can't share with me. He'll be a father soon; I want him to meet mine, and this is the place to do it. But first, lunch. I'm starving.

We sit down – Peeta has to help me to the floor, I'm so big now – and tuck in to our meal. We talk about nothing in particular, but underneath it all is a calm presence. I'm never anxious here, and I attribute that to my father. I think Peeta feels it, too. He smiles at me and kisses me, and I am happy. It strikes me that I haven't had a bad day in months. That makes me grin around my sandwich. Peeta raises an eyebrow, but I just shake my head and keep smiling.

After he finishes his lunch, my husband comes to sit beside me. I feel as though I should say something, but no words come to mind. They're all inadequate. But I know Peeta doesn't need the words. He knows that I am no good with them, that I never have been and never will be. Instead, he wraps his arms around me and places his hands on my roundness and says the words for me.

"We'll bring her here," he murmurs into my ear. "And we'll teach her to swim in the pond and how to know which wild berries are good to eat." He brushes my hair away from my face and kisses my temple. "And when she's old enough to understand, you'll tell her about her grandfather, and you'll teach her all of his songs."

I smile softly at the image he's painted in my mind: our child, singing my father's songs as he or she plays in this clearing. A little brother or sister toddling after them…

I take a deep breath and let it out slowly. Have to make it through this one first, Katniss. I settle back against Peeta, sigh, and begin to sing.

* * *

 

I wake slowly, stretching out and hoping to find my husband still in bed next to me, but it's too late. He's already left for the bakery. I hear no noise from downstairs; my mother must have also left the house. She's been spending time by lending her knowledge to the clinic. Knowing that I'm home alone fills me with a lazy sort of pleasure. Peeta and my mother have been fawning and fretting over me nonstop since the festival, and I'm ready to strangle them both. Their absence means that I can do whatever I please, like lie in bed for a few more hours, or soak in the tub and use all of the hot water. I consider this last one with enthusiasm, thinking of a conversation I had with Delly about her severe lack of personal time.

I'm in the bathroom undressing before I can overthink the implications of climbing in and out of the tub. But as I strip off my underwear, I notice a dark red stain. My stomach drops.

It can't be blood. Not now.

My only thought is to find Peeta, but rationality creeps past the black cloud fogging my brain and shouts that the clinic is where I need to go. And quickly. I barely notice pulling on new clothes. A blanket of fear has smothered me and I am numb with it. I have only one thought: get to the clinic. Get to my mother and Dr. Bryke.

I stumble out of the house and down the street, moving as quickly as I can without running, which I'm incapable of. Scenarios flash through my head. Miscarriage. The baby's in trouble. My placenta has ruptured. But rationale again seeps through: I don't think I'm still bleeding. The blood in my underwear had been dark brown, thus old, like a menstrual flow. And it had seemed mucousy. I cringe from fear as I hurry along. Dr. Bryke will know. Mom will know. Everything will be okay, Katniss, it'll be okay…

It takes me far too long to get to the clinic. I rush in, shouting for my mother before I can stop myself. The receptionist stares at me as a nurse comes in, and when she sees the fear in my face she takes me by the arm and leads me to a chair. The only word I can sputter out when she asks what's wrong is "blood," and she squeezes my hand and immediately takes me to a room. My mother rushes in a few moments later, her face white with panic.

"Katniss, what happened?" Her voice is clinical, but she can't hide the fear in her eyes as she pulls on exam gloves. I hurriedly tell her what I discovered as I pull off my pants and climb onto the table. Her mouth is set into a grim line.

"Just lay back," she tells me, and I obey, clutching at my stomach. Her hands poke and prod at my outside and in, her brows drawn together in concentration. Halfway through her examination, Dr. Bryke walks in, and my mother retracts her hands and turns to my physician with a sigh that sounds relieved to my hopeful ears.

"False alarm," she says. "Her cervix is thinning. I think she just lost her mucous plug."

Dr. Bryke nods and pulls on gloves and rolls over on a stool. She performs her own exam and smiles up at me.

"Your mother's right, Katniss," she says. "What you're experiencing is called bloody show. It means your body is preparing for labor."

I feel my body relax all at once. "The baby's okay?"

"The baby's fine," my mother says. "This means you could go into labor any day now." She beams at me, and I smile shakily back. Any day now?

"But I've still got two weeks left till I'm due," I squeak. "What if the baby is early?" Early babies had happened often enough before my Reaping for me to know that they often didn't make it. They were to little. But both women smiled in reassurance.

"You're far enough along that the baby would be fine if it were born right now." Dr. Bryke pulls off her gloves and throws them away. "From now on I want you to rest. No hard work or heavy lifting. Keep an eye on any contractions, all right?"

I nod and sit up, reaching for my pants to pull them back on. My mother helps me get back into them and hugs me afterward, and I cling to her in relief. The baby is okay. The baby would be here any day now, really this time. I felt tingly with the knowledge. The baby squirms around, as if to solidify it all. Dr. Bryke suggests that they get an ultrasound while I'm here, to get one more look at how things are going on the inside. I let them lead me to another room, all the while anxious to find Peeta and tell him the good news.

As they move the sensor across my bloated stomach, I stare at the screen in rapt attention. The baby is curled up tight on the monitor, its fists clenched near its face. Only a little bit longer, I think, and terror pinches me. There's no going back now. Days, maybe weeks, until it's here. This has become a terrifying reality. I clutch at my mother's hand, grateful that she is here.

"I want my mom to do the delivery," I blurt out. Dr. Bryke doesn't even blink as she clicks away on the machine, snapping pictures and taking measurements.

"Of course," she says. "I had assumed you would." She sits back and takes up her clipboard and makes notes. "Everything is exactly as it should be, Mrs. Mellark. Now, I want you to go home and prepare an overnight bag, just in case you have to be brought here to deliver. Otherwise, we'll do a home birth."

I nod and sit up, wiping the gel off of my skin with a paper towel before pulling my shirt down. My mother helps me off the exam table and looks at Dr. Bryke.

"I'll prepare the house when I get home," she says, and the doctor nods, scribbling away on her clip board. Mom turns back to me and smiles. "I'll be home later this afternoon. You go back and rest."

I nod and kiss her cheek and leave the clinic, heading down the street towards the Square. I want to go to the bakery and tell Peeta the news. But when I get there, it's closed up, with a note on the door that says he's out to lunch. Frowning, I turn around and waddle back down the street towards the Victor's Village. But when I get back to the house, I can't find him. He doesn't answer when I call his name, and after a cursory search – I hate the staircase more with each passing day – he's still nowhere to be found. Shrugging, I head into the kitchen for a glass of water. It's when I'm looking out the window over the sink that I see him. He's standing in the backyard, though I can't tell what he's doing. Planning a shed or a new garden, maybe. It doesn't matter, really, and I plod over to the door and step out into the late October chill. Anxiety makes me sweat. He doesn't turn when the door clicks closed, he's so lost in thought.

"Peeta, I have something to tell you—"

He comes to life, but stiffly, and even though he doesn't turn, I know instantly that something is wrong. Very wrong. He should be walking towards me, smiling –

"I hope it's to explain this," I hear him say, and he holds up a piece of white fabric. Doesn't turn, just lifts whatever it is in his hand so that I can see it. And then I realize that he's holding the pair of underwear I had been wearing this morning. The ones stained with blood and mucus. Yes, it's what I wanted to talk to him about, but I have discovered the real problem just as he turns his head to finally look at me.

"You tried to kill it, didn't you?"

This is not Peeta.

My stomach is in my throat at his accusation, but I know that this is a hijacking attack. This isn't my Peeta.

"No, Peeta," I say, holding out my hands, coaxing him down. But an alarm goes off in my head, flashing "too late." Still, I try. "The baby's fine. Look," I press a hand to my protruding front, "It's right here, safe and sound. Come here, feel it move –"

But his eyes are wild as he clenches my underwear in his hand. "No, you killed it. The evidence is right here, look at it, look what you did –"

He's sweating, and I take a step back toward the house. "Peeta," I try again, a little louder. "Not real. The baby is fine, look -!"

But the scars of venom have made up his mind, and he begins to advance. I curl my arms around my belly without thinking. "Peeta!" I shout. "It's not real! It's not real, please, listen to me –!" Still he moves forward, rage distorting his face, and I choke.

"Not real!" I am screaming now, trying not to trip as I move back inside and lock the door – but what if he breaks the windows? Or the door, for that matter? He's got the strength of an ox when he's himself; in a hijacked rage he is unstoppable. I clutch at my stomach, and the baby squirms in response to my fear.

"Peeta, please –"

"You killed our baby!" he roars. "I know you did! You never wanted it in the first place! You tried to kill it before and I stopped you but now – " Something in him breaks, and I cower against the side of the house that I've blindly backed into. He is on me, murder in his dilated eyes. I cannot be louder than the voices in his head. I cannot bring him back. Fifteen years together, after finally starting a family, he is finally going to kill me. Presidents Snow and Coin are finally going to win –

I can feel his hands on my throat, cutting off a scream, and then they are gone with the sound of shattering glass. Peeta's eyes roll into the back of his head and he crumbles to the ground, unconscious. My scream is stuck on my tongue and my eyes meet the bloodshot ones of Haymitch, who is clutching the neck of a broken liquor bottle. He is shaking. So am I. I think my knees might give out.

"I – He –" My voice cracks, and the shaking is turning to full on tremors. I might be crying, but my whole body is numb, so I can't tell. Haymitch stops me from trying to explain.

"Inside. Go. Before you pass out."

"But –"

He touches my shoulder. "Go. I'll take care of him."

I hesitate, too shocked to know what to do. Peeta is on the ground, out cold, with trickles of blood winding through his curls. He attacked me. He tried to kill me. Again. The shaking doubles.

"Katniss."

My eyes snap to his, and I nod, but it takes a gentle nudge to get me going. But once I do, I do not stop. I stumble into the kitchen, ghosting past the furniture in the living room, till I reach the stairs. I wander down the hall until I reach the bathroom. I don't know why I chose this room. All I know is that it is dark. I climb into the deep claw-footed tub and gingerly lower myself down, pretending that I am sinking. I curl myself around my belly, my baby, and let the shaking and the darkness swallow me whole.

* * *

 

It is my mother that finds me.

She says nothing, simply pulls me from the tub and checks me for any injuries. When I am giving the all clear, she embraces me, and it is then that I break, sobbing into her shoulder. They are tears for the baby, for Peeta. For our family that is not even complete and yet already so broken.

"He's downstairs on the couch," my mother tells me. "Haymitch gave him some morphling to keep him calm. When he found out –" She looks down at the floor and then meets my eyes. "I think you should go to him."

Every nerve in my body wants to resist, but I nod and walk with her down the stairs to the living room. He is lying on the sofa, his eyes drooping. My mother has bandaged the cut on his head. Haymitch sits on a chair by the wall, his hands folded in front of him, his eyes focused on my husband's prone form. Sentry duty. Our eyes meet across the room and he nods once in my direction before standing and stepping into the kitchen. He doesn't want to watch what he knows will be a tearful reunion.

Carefully, wary of my own husband, I inch around the couch so that I come into his view. It takes a moment for him to register that I am there – Haymitch must have given him a bit more morphling that we usually give him after episodes. But when he does see me, and his eyes manage to focus, his face dissolves into anguish. My throat closes up.

"Katniss… Oh god, Katniss, I'm so sorry…" His words are slurred together from the morphling. In a few steps I am next to the couch and I gingerly sit at the end where his head is, and he clutches to me with a grip that could have broken me in two. His head rests on my stomach, and his hand presses against me, feeling for our child's movements.

"It's all right," I murmur, tears catching in my throat. "It wasn't you."

He mumbles something incoherent into my stomach; whether it's a plea for forgiveness or some sort of explanation, I cannot tell. He clings to me like a child, and I hold onto him tight.

"Peeta… shhh…" I begin to rock him as I have done so many times before after moments like this, after he has left me only to return and find that he has come near to destroying what he loves. "It wasn't you, Peeta. It's all right. I'm fine. The baby's fine. Look, feel. She's in there, she's moving." A silent sob wracks his body, and I close my eyes to fight back my own tears. "She'll love you, Peeta," I tell him. "She loves you already. And I love you. I forgive you."

He whimpers, and I rock him until he is asleep.


	12. Week 39

** Week 39 **

The day was November 2nd.

I'll always remember how ordinary that day had started. I woke up feeling uncomfortable – but that had become normal by that point. I was a balloon with a round face and fat ankles. Peeta would still say that I was beautiful, but I've come to believe since then that I could be a wrinkly old woman and he would still call me that. I waddled through the day, spending most of it in bed or on the couch while my mother kept a watchful eye on me. I had been experiencing practice contractions on and off since I lost my mucous plug, but none of them lasted for more than a few seconds at a time and were far apart. I spent time in the nursery that day, rocking in the chair by the window, my hands on my belly, trying to feel inward, to find out when the baby would come. My mother kept saying "any day now," judging by how low the baby had dropped. All I knew was that I was ready for it to be out. Everything about me hurt – my back, my hips, my feet. I kept running into everything with my belly, and I could barely pull myself to standing without help. I was sick of being helpless and cranky. I was short with everyone and kept bursting into tears at the most random of things. In short, I was sick of it. But in the end, I almost didn't want the baby to be born. It was safe inside of me. Once born, it would never be safe again.

I tried to explain this to Peeta, but I don't think he fully understood my trepidation. "This is the safest place it could be, Katniss," he'd said. "The danger's passed." But a glance at my mother and I knew that she, at least, agreed that he was wrong. My mother knew the fear. She understood the terror of losing the safety net of the womb. She'd done it twice. How, I don't think I'll ever know.

The night came. I remember that I was dreaming of my father, of the night Prim fell ill with the sweating fever. How he'd held me when we thought we'd lose her, when the world had seemed so small…

I woke with a start, feeling the sudden urge to go the bathroom. I crawled out of bed and waddled down the hall, and as I sat on the toilet and relieved myself, I nearly fell asleep again. That's when I realized that it was taking too long. I frowned and sat there, wondering, and then it came to me.

My water had broken.

My first instinct was to panic. But what was the point? I asked myself. There was no stopping anything now. I wondered why I hadn't felt any contractions, and as if to answer my question, my gut contracts and I let out a muffled groan. I'm surprised by how sharp it feels, how deep and wrenching it is. This was no practice contraction. Steeling myself, I clean myself up and stand, and then waddle back to the bedroom. I turn on the light, and Peeta groans in his sleep.

"Peeta," I call, shuffling over to the bed. "Peeta, wake up."

Ever the heavy sleeper, he simply groans and rolls over, pulling the blankets with him. I grab them and yank them away, making him loudly protest.

"Peeta!"

One eye opens, almost in a glare. He grunts.

"Peeta, the baby's coming."

It takes him a moment to recognize what I've said, and when it comes together in his head it's as if lightning has struck him. He shoots out of bed, shoving his glasses on over his wide eyes, and he turns to me, grabbing my forearms and squeezing. "What? You're sure?" He touches my belly, as if he can make a contraction happen to prove it. It's almost comical, and I try not to laugh.

"My water broke in the bathroom," I tell him, feeling oddly calm. "Go downstairs and get Mom."

He nods rapidly and rushes out of the room, but not before kissing me full on the mouth. I giggle but its cut off by another contraction, this one a little more intense than the last, and I sit down on the edge of the bed, inhaling sharply through my nose. A few moments later, Peeta and my mother come into the room. My mother is smiling, sleep still covering her face, but Peeta is the exact opposite. He buzzes like a bee, anxiety and excitement pouring off of him in waves. My mother comes over to me and presses her hands to my belly, feeling around and smiling.

"When was your last contraction?" she asks. I lean back, letting her feel around.

"Just before you walked in. Before that… ten minutes ago?"

She nods, her eyes far away, as if she can see inside of me. "Peeta," she says without turning to him, "get dressed and fetch Dr. Bryke. She'll know what to bring."

Peeta nods and begins to throw on his clothes, putting on his shirt backwards and tripping over his shoes. I do everything I can not to laugh, but his anxiety is funny, and I smile at him before he kisses me and bolts from the room. When he's gone, my mother sighs, as if in relief.

"Now that he's out from under our feet…"

I finally let myself laugh, and she smiles at me, then sets about gathering up the blankets.

"We'll want a stripped bed. I'm going to go downstairs and put water on to boil. Will you be all right for a few minutes?"

I nod. "I'll change into a nightgown?" She nods back and leaves the room, and I pull off my shirt and sleep pants and change into an old ratty nightgown. Another contraction comes on, and I hold my breath as my gut squeezes tight, counting the seconds until it passes. It leaves me a little breathless, and I move to sit on the edge of the bed, and the baby inside of me squirms at the tightness it's encapsulated in.

"Soon," I murmur. Terror overtakes me for a moment. It's too soon, I think, I'm not ready. But I know it's too late to stop it. This is it. It's finally time.

My mother comes back into the room with a stack of towels and a pitcher of water. She sees the look on my face and comes over to me.

"Katniss?"

I grip her hand, knowing I'll never get it out if Peeta is here. "I'm scared, Mom."

She pats my hand. "Everything will be all right."

"It's gonna hurt, isn't it?" Even after all of my experiences, I still have an aversion to any sort of pain.

"Of course. But it's nothing my strong girl can't handle."

I take a deep breath and grip her hand tight.

"Don't leave, okay?"

"Never again," she whispers, and she kisses my temple. We sit there until another contraction hits, and I cringe.

"Don't push just yet, dear," she says, then has me lie back on the bed. She fetches a pair of rubber examination gloves from the bag she brought with her and comes back to the bed. "Now, I'm going to check how far you've dilated…" She spreads my legs and examines me. I shift at the intrusion but let her do her work, knowing that there's more of this to come, and that a few fingers inside of me will be nothing compared to a whole baby. When she's finished, she smiles and takes off the gloves.

"You're at four centimeters," she says. "We won't have you push till you're at ten, understand?" She's reverted to her nursing attitude, but it's laced with affection. "Until then, we'll just try and keep you comfortable. Would you like a glass of water?"

I nod, unable to speak because another contraction has come on. I groan a little, and my mother turns back to me.

"Breathe through it, Katniss. That's it. Just breathe."

I do as she instructs, but the pain is sharp, and I don't unclench my fists until it's passed. The worst part is that I know it will only get worse as time passes. The thought makes me blanch, but I swallow the fear and steel myself for the pain. I will NOT be one of the screaming women that my mother used to deliver back in the Seam. I will NOT be one of the women that cries and bemoans her condition. I will be strong. And I will not cry out, even though I know no one will hold it against me or judge me for it. I am a two-time winner of the most brutal Games in the history of our world. I have regrown my ribs. I will not let something as trivial as _childbirth_ get the best of me.

My mother fetches a glass of water for me, and I sip at it. "How long is this going to take?" I ask her eventually, after another contraction passes. She smiles at me ruefully. "You're moving along rather nicely," she says. "And the baby could be here quickly enough. But it will be hours, dear. At least a few more." She sees my lips purse, and she smiles again.

"Be brave, Katniss. I know you can do it."

Reassuring words. But I hope I don't begin to doubt myself too soon.

The hours seemed to pass excruciatingly slow and fly by all at once. Peeta returned within the hour that he left, towing a disheveled Dr. Bryke behind him. He must have run the whole way there. My doctor is calm and collected, if tired looking, and she pulls my mother aside and speaks in hushed tones while Peeta rushes to my side.

"How are you feeling? Are you okay?" He takes my hand and kisses the back of it. "I came back as fast as I could. Can I get you anything?"

It's hard not to laugh. I am uncomfortable, as if I can't get in the right position, but there's nothing he can do about that. "No, I'm fine," I tell him. He deflates a little, almost as if he was hoping for something to help with, for a way to be useful. I squeeze his hand.

"Some tea would be nice," I say, and he nods and darts out of the room. My mother and Dr. Bryke smile as he leaves.

"Good idea. He'll need to be kept busy," says Dr. Bryke. "Nothing worse than a fretting husband hovering around."

That irks me just a little, because I want Peeta to be here for all of it – I need him to be here – but I have a feeling I will agree with her in time.

Dr. Bryke comes over and does an examination on me, doing all the same things my mother did earlier. When she pulls her hand away, she smiles.

"Lovely. You're coming along nicely."

I sigh and then clench up as a contraction seizes me. I suck in my breath and blow it out through my mouth, using the technique my mother taught me. Dr. Bryke nods.

"Good, breathe through it," she encourages.

I nod and breathe in through my nose again and out through my mouth till it passes. My body sags into the mattress when it's done. I'm starting to feel tired already, and there's still hours to go. That thought makes me pale.

"Katniss?" My mother comes over to the bed, but I wave her away.

"I'm fine, that one was just stronger than the last."

Dr. Bryke asks, "Rate it one to ten, ten being the most painful?"

I think back to all of the injuries I've sustained, the burns, the breaks, the gashes, and the healing process of all of them, and I know that right now these contractions are nothing compared to the feeling of regrowing half the skin on my body.

"Five," I say. She and my mother exchange a glance.

"Be honest, Katniss," my mother says. "There's no need to be brave. We need to know how it really feels."

I reconsider for a moment. "Alright, six."

They grin at me, and Dr. Bryke pats my hand. "Now it's time for the waiting game."

* * *

 

I understand quickly enough what Dr. Bryke means about the waiting game. As the contractions begin to lengthen and gain in intensity, I began to rethink my definitions of pain. A low-sitting pressure burns in my pelvis, and the hurt radiates through my body. Peeta sits on the bed beside me, letting me crush his hand when a contraction squeezes my gut, wiping my brow with a cool washrag when I begin to sweat, holding the bowl for me when I become sick. He stuffs pillows behind my back to prop me up, moves them away when I thrash about and want to lie flat. My mother and Dr. Bryke periodically check me for how much I've dilated, my blood pressure, my pulse. Everything is normal. After two hours of lying in bed, suffering through ever-intensifying contractions, I simply cannot take it anymore.

"I can't lay here anymore," I snap, pushing my husband away from me.

"Let's walk then," my mother offers, and I nod in relief. They help me off the bed and we begin to pace around the room. It seems to help, and when the next contraction comes, I double over and groan with the pain. Peeta seems to shake as I breathe through it, and it slowly hits me: he could be on the verge of an episode. I grasp his hands and murmur, "Stay with me." He takes a deep breath and nods, mumbling "always". It must be hard for him, seeing me in so much pain and being unable to do anything about it. Knowing that this I the only means to the end we both want. Childbirth equals pain. But seeing me in pain has always put him on edge, and after his last attack… he'd never forgive himself if he lost control now.

"Peeta," I say, straightening when the contraction is over, "I would really love a cheese bun right now."

He stares at me in shock. "Right now?"

I glance at my mother and Dr. Bryke, who give me perfectly blank looks, and I turn back to my husband.

"Please?" I squeeze his hand for good measure. He hesitates, not wanting to leave my side. I press further.

"Please, Peeta? Just one. For me?"

We share a meaningful look, and he finally sighs. He kisses my lips and then my forehead before relinquishing his hold on me and heading downstairs. I watch him leave, then look to my mother.

"Get Haymitch. Tell him he needs to watch Peeta for me."

Without so much as blinking in reproach, my mother nods and leaves the room. Dr. Bryke comes to my side and we resume pacing.

The world seems to shrink down to just my body in the course of the rest of the night. By the early sunlight of dawn I can no longer stand, and I return to the bed. I am unable to keep the keening noises, the groans and whimpers of pain from escaping my throat now. Dr. Bryke says that she has medicine from the Capitol that will make the pain less intense, but I refuse it. I can do this. I've been through much worse. But as I alternate between walking and lying on the bed, propped up on pillows and sucking on ice chips that Peeta has brought from the freezer (cheese buns completely forgotten after I got sick again and cried for him to return to my side), I begin to wonder if I really can do this. I had learned to live beyond self-reliance years ago, and now here I am, faced with a task that only I can complete. No assistance. No sponsors. No shiny little silver parachutes. It is now me and my body and my baby.

I think I would rather face a pack of muttations than go through with this.

The sun is coming in through the windows before long. Contractions rip through me, one after another, and I curl into myself on the mattress, groaning. At one point Peeta tries to rub my back to ease the pain, but I shove him away.

"Peeta, I love you," I say through clenched teeth, "but please don't touch me right now."

He doesn't seem hurt by it, thankfully, and continues to feed me ice chips, which are the only things that seem to help me cope with the pain. After a while though, his anxiety begins to aggravate me, and I rather rudely order him to go away and "sit with Haymitch or something." This does seem to put him out, but my mother lays a reassuring hand on his shoulder and escorts him out.

Another hour passes before the first tears start leaking from my eyes. My mother comes over to me and brushes the hair from my face and asks what's wrong. I open my eyes and whisper, "I can't do this anymore, Mom."

She smiles softly at me and continues running her fingers through my hair. It's soothing, something she used to do when I was young. "Oh Katniss, it's almost over."

I shake my head, my throat closing up. "I can't, Mom, it hurts too much –"

"And it will get worse," she finishes. "But you can do it. Just imagine being able to finally hold your baby. That will get you through."

I nod and try to imagine it, and it takes my mind away, if only briefly. I moan out that I want Peeta back, and when my mother calls to him I can hear him run up the stairs. He bursts into the room and is immediately at my side. Haymitch follows him in shortly after, looking like he's halfway through a bottle. I don't blame him. In his time, plenty of women died in our District from childbirth. Plenty of women still do. Maybe that's why he's drinking now. He's afraid I'll die, too.

"Well ain't you a sight," he grumbles in my direction. I give him my middle finger. He chuckles.

"Get the show on the road already," he says. "Your couch is shit and I ain't gettin' any younger." With that, he exits the room. Peeta shakes his head and then asks after a moment, "Am I allowed to touch you now?"

I nod and he squeezes onto the bed beside me, wrapping an arm around my shoulder and kissing my temple.

"You're so brave," he whispers in my ear. "I can't even imagine—" He pauses as I clench his hand because of a contraction, one that makes me cry out.

"That one sounded good," Dr. Bryke chirps, and she comes over to the bed and asks me to open my legs for another examination. She seems pleased with the results.

"Well," she says, "You're completely dilated. We can start pushing now."

Here it is, the big moment. My heart pounds in my chest and I take a deep breath, trying to calm myself down. My mother and Dr. Bryke instruct Peeta to hold one of my knees back against my chest while Dr. Bryke holds the other. This shift in position suddenly seems to make the pressure all the more urgent, and I feel like crying from all of the anxiety that has suddenly sprung up in my mind. Will she be healthy? Will there be anything wrong with her? Will it be a boy instead of a girl? We haven't even picked a name out—

"Katniss!" I snap out of it to look down at my mother, who is kneeling on the bed between my open legs. "I need you to focus," she says. "On the next contraction I want you to bear down into your bottom and push, okay?" I nod rapidly and suck in a breath, and then another. The next contraction comes on, and I take the deepest breath I can and then hold it and push. I don't know how I know what to do. My body just knows, as if it's the most primal of knowledge stored within me. Letting my body take over, I bear down into it like my mother said. It is like knives stabbing me. My mother counts to ten out loud and then I release my breath, panting. I glance up at Peeta and he looks slightly green. I clutch at his hand and grunt, "Stay with me, dammit." He looks down at me and grimaces, but nods.

"I'm not going anywhere," he says.

My mother snaps her head up and smiles in encouragement. "That was good, Katniss. Do it again."

And I do. Push after push, I somehow manage to throw my remaining strength into each one. I am moaning and crying and embarrassing myself with how weak I sound, but all I know right now is the pain and the pressure and the overwhelming need to push. When I release my breath from the seventh or eighth push, I let out a weak whimper. My body is taut like a bowstring, ready to snap, ready to be released. I bite my lip and press on.

"One more, Katniss, I can see the head—"

Peeta peeks over my leg and his mouth falls open. "Oh my god," he mumbles, and then he's kissing my crown and whispering in my ear, "You can do it, Katniss. She's right there. You can do it."

My mother reaches behind her for another blanket and spreads it beneath her legs. "One more, Katniss. One more and then it'll be here, I promise, just one more…"

My body feels pushed to its limits. I am shaking, and though Peeta grips my hand tight, I am terrified.

"I don't think I can—"

"Hush, yes you can."

"You can do it. One more –"

"I can see her, Katniss, just one more –"

This is it.

I take a breath and bear down, putting all I have left into it. A slow scream works its way out of my throat and I feel like every knife in the house is stabbing me, cutting me to pieces. And then all at once, like the rush of a wave, I feel her slip from me and my mother is grinning and Peeta is laughing and Dr. Bryke is rushing for another towel.

"Oh my god –"

"It's a girl!" my mother exclaims, and I break down into tears. There she is, a bloody, ugly, beautiful baby girl, squalling at the top of her little lungs, and I am in love. The force of it could have knocked me over. Peeta kisses me, his tears soaking my already wet face.

"I love you," he says, and then my mother lays the baby on my chest, shaking and screaming and still covered in blood and goo, and she is perfect. I laugh and cry at the same time.

"Hi," I murmur. "Hi."

My mother calls Peeta to her side to cut the umbilical cord, and Dr. Bryke comes over to collect the baby and clean her up. I don't want her to leave, but I know that she needs to be looked over. My mother continues working at me, bringing me back to my own body.

"Everything looks good," she says as she wraps up the afterbirth. "No excess bleeding. But you did tear so I'm going to stitch you up…" But everything she says and does goes over my head in the haze of exhaustion and disbelief. I watch as Peeta follows Dr. Bryke over to the dresser that has turned into a makeshift exam table. He has removed his glasses so that he can wipe the tears from his cheeks. The look on his face is sheer joy as he looks down at our new daughter, and I know then that this was all worth it. That I made the right decision.

While my mother stitches me up, Dr. Bryke brings my daughter back to me. Grinning, she lays the bundle on my chest, and my arms come up to cradle her. In that moment, I am reduced to nothing.

"Oh, Peeta," I whisper. "She's perfect."

A head full of dark hair tops her slightly misshapen skull (my mother says this is just from birth and that it will round out soon). She opens her eyes and they are the smoky grey-blue of all newborns. Her bottom lip sticks out in a pout, as if she's upset that she's out of the womb, and I grin, tears flowing freely down my face.

"Hello, little one," I say, and she blinks slowly at me, yawns, and closes her eyes. My heart melts in my chest. Is it always going to be this heartbreaking?

Peeta returns to my side and reaches out a finger to gently brush her cheek. It's almost as if he's afraid to touch her, as though she'll break. We stare in awe, and Peeta kisses me, mumbling over and over, "Thank you, thank you…"

My mother and Dr. Bryke leave the room quietly, knowing that we need time to ourselves. I hurt all over, but I no longer notice. I am exhausted beyond anything I've ever known, but I don't care. The man I love is beside me, wrapping his arms around the two of us, cradling me as I cradle her. Our heads are together as we watch this precious thing in my arms. This man, who has saved me more times than I can count, whom I love deeply – I have finally given him what he has wanted most. For the first time since that day outside the bakery, when he tossed me those burnt loaves of bread, I feel as though the debt has been repaid.

"What are we going to call her?" he asks, his voice raspy. He swallows, never taking his eyes from his daughter. "We never decided—"

I don't have to think. It is as if someone whispers it into my ear.

"Grace," I tell him. "We'll call her Grace."

I feel him smile, and he reaches out and nudges her little hand, her tiny fingers curling around his large one. "Our Grace," he murmurs, tears in his voice, and I lean down and brush a kiss against her soft crown.

The song comes to me easily now, whispered in my ear in the same voice that gave me her name.

" _You are my sunshine, my only sunshine. You make me happy when skies are grey…_ "


	13. Epilogue

He chases her around the yard, her squeals ringing in my ear and making me tense up, even after all this time. I have to remind myself that they're just playing, that she's not screaming from fear. And I tell myself, _It's just Peeta. Peeta will keep her safe._

I glance up from the laundry basket to watch her stumble on chubby legs – my daughter, her dark curls bouncing around her face as she runs from her pursuer. My husband plods along behind her, his arms raised to make himself scarier, but a grin is plastered on his face and it ruins the effect. I smile at the scene and go back to my chores.

She'll be three in a few weeks. It's hard to believe that it's already been three years. She has filled my life with so much joy that I can't imagine what it would be like without her. I think back to how terrified I was, how scared of how she might not love me. It's all a bad dream now. When she looks at me her blue eyes light up, and she calls me "Mama" and kisses my cheek when I lift her into my arms. My smile grows.

I still have episodes every now and then, though the medicine my mother gave me has helped me significantly. I feel next to normal on most days. The days that aren't so good, I usually stay in bed. Peeta will watch Grace on those days, or my mother, but she will always manage to sneak into the room and crawl into bed with me and just curl herself up in my arms. She doesn't squirm, doesn't talk, just whispers "I love you, Mama," and kisses me and falls asleep. A guilty part inside of me wishes I weren't so distant on those days, wishes that I could express to my daughter how much I love and cherish her, but my illness won't let me. I make up for it on better days, swinging her around and holding her close to me. I never wanted to be closed off to my child, but my mother and Peeta encourage me that it's not my fault. Peeta says that Grace understands, that when asked where I am on bad days, she replies simply, "Mama is sick," and goes about her business. For that I am grateful. I was never an understanding child towards my mother. I am undeserving of one so gracious to me.

I look back up at my family. Grace is sitting in the grass, picking dandelions. If only she knew how important that weed was, how much it contributed to her own existence. My eyes move to Peeta, and he glances over at me, smiling a smile that has always been for my eyes only. His eyes are bright, and he looks back to our daughter and begins weaving the flowers she has picked into a crown that he places on her head. She squeals in delight.

"Mama! Look!"

She runs to me and climbs into my lap, throwing her arms around me and chattering about how she is princess now. I look over her head at my husband's laughing face, and I nod and tell her she is the most beautiful princess in all of Panem. All at once she decides that she wants down, and she toddles off to the adjoining yard where Haymitch has his geese fenced up and begins telling them a story. They squawk and ignore her, but she doesn't notice. Peeta comes onto the porch and leans down, brushing a kiss to my temple and wrapping his arms around me. We admire our little creation in adoring silence, holding onto each other and smiling.

"Bout time for another one, don't you think?" he asks in a low voice, and I roll my eyes. He's been on this kick for the last year.

"One's enough," I reply per usual, shrugging out of his embrace and picking a towel from the basket to fold. He just smirks at me. He knows he's going to win this one like he did the last time, in the end. I ignore him.

"For now," I add eventually, and he grins and kisses me. I shake my head and shove him back onto the lawn, and he laughs and walks over to Grace, who is now antagonizing the geese with a rendition of her favorite song. I can hear her from where I sit, and her little voice washes over my ears, echoing of the voice of her grandfather, who is never far from my thoughts these days.

That night, as we put her to bed, I sing to her the same song, and she sings it with me. The same song I sang to her when she was born, and the song I'll be singing to her till long after she's grown.

" _You'll never know dear, how much I love you, so please don't take my sunshine away."_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to everyone that supported me on this journey and everyone that came after to enjoy it in its completed form. Special shout out to my mom for being an amazing resource about being pregnant while depressed, and for telling me about all of the weird quirks pregnancy gives a woman. 
> 
> Comments are never expected but always appreciated. 
> 
> Until next time,
> 
> Avey


End file.
